Logical Arrival
by Crystal Shekeira
Summary: G1. Flamestrike thought she was being sent to Earth as part of a plan to rid the planet of the Predacons and Terrorcons. Little did she know that she would find something of greater importance. Written as a request for a friend.
1. The Arrival

**Author's Note:** _This story was written as a semi-commission/request for a dear friend. Flamestrike is her intellectual property and the tale is posted with her permission. Any haranguing will be politely ignored – as with any commission, you are working for someone else. :)_

_**

* * *

Logical Arrival  
**_Chapter One  
**Autobot City, circa 2000**

_"Ironhide to City Tower."_

_"City Tower reads you, Ironhide. We've got you on radar."_

_"Evenin' miss. How's the skies?"_

_"As clear as they can be. Cosmos reports nothing unusual in the vicinity. We're scanning all frequencies as we speak."_

_"I can see the ol' bobble out th' port screen. Approachin' Earth space in a few clicks."_

_"Acknowledged. Sending Skyfire and Aerialbot contingent to meet you at the rendezvous point."_

_"See ya in a bit, darlin'."_

* * *

The bulky red mech in the pilot's chair switched the comm off, letting silence fill the cabin. To his right, a lighter-red, blockier mech was fiddling with the scanning equipment. "I've got Skyfire on comm if ya wanna chat, Ironhide," he said. 

"Not unless he's got somethin' int'resting t' say," the older mech returned with a laugh.

From her vantage point right behind the gruff mech Ironhide, Flamestrike could see the round, blue-green globe that was her new post growing increasingly larger in the shuttle's view screen. A thin trickle of trepidation ran up her steel spine, but was quickly banished by the prospect of a new venture. She'd heard so much about the new front of the Autobot-Decepticon war that when the call came for more troops to be stationed at Autobot City, she'd been one of the first to lay her sigil on Elita-1's desk.

While that first transfer of troops had taken several months to shift, containing over forty highly-specialized personnel in addition to one hundred regular maintenance, this shuttle held but twelve Autobots – and she was the lone femme.

—Not that her cortexal gender had anything to do with her posting, mind. Still, the brown-red-gold femme was slightly proud to have been selected by Elita herself and approved by Optimus Prime, the Autobot commander. While not one to praise herself excessively, Flamestrike privately wondered if her skills as an espionage agent, the only one in the five bands around Iacon with a perfect record, had anything to do with it. She thought that might have been one of the influencing factors. However, even with her credentials, she no real understanding of what her position on Earth was going to be. The planet was a wild, organic place, with a dominant form of life embroiled in an interstellar war that wasn't theirs to begin with.

_"Skyfire here. Welcome back to Earth, folks!"_

Torn from her thoughts, Flamestrike peered over Ironhide's shoulder as the deep, soft voice came over the comm. "We're glad t'be back, partner," he drawled, reaching over the main console to flick several switches. From deep within the shuttle, a whine rolled along the floor, heralding the emergence of the main guns. Around her, the mechs were rising in their seats, going for their weapons.

The sudden prepping of artillery had the old rust-red mech turning in his chair. "Hey! Put those away," he barked. "It's just a precaution."

Placidly, Flamestrike gazed around her, noting the sheepish expressions on the mechs' facial planes. She supposed being on the front lines had to turn someone trigger-happy.

_"Keep 'er level, 'hide,"_ Skyfire continued, blissfully unaware. _"Do you read Silverbolt?"_

"Read 'em and note 'em," the other mech returned. "Ironhide to City Tower."

_"City Tower here,"_ the same femme voice replied. _"We read you, Ironhide. Sending out the beam now, Blaster. See you when you land!"_

"Later, Flare," the blocky red mech Blaster promised, spinning dials with a fervent passion.

Moments later, the shuttle began to shake with the shock of entry. Peering over Ironhide's shoulder, Flamestrike watched as a brilliant coalescence of reds, golds and whites enveloped them, spreading over the burnt orange protective plating. Both mechs had their hands on the controls, deftly steering them towards their intended target.

Once through the upper atmosphere, Blaster lowered the shuttle's protective shields, allowing the passengers to finally see Earth. Flamestrike rested her left arm on the sill, shifting her spoiler so that it rode low on her shoulders in order to peer outwards. Darkness covered this part of the world, sparkling pin-points of light the only indication of habitation. In the distence, a giant mass of illumination heralded Autobot City. It was towards this centerpoint that the shuttle was streaking, the roar of the engines never more potent in Flamestrike's audios. Running counterpoint to the spark-deep rumble was the higher whine of the five jets that seemed to drop out of the clouds and surround the shuttle. Through the darkness, Flamestrike could barely make out the Autobot symbols on their wings.

As they dropped further through the wispy cloud cover, the jets pulled off as one, flying into the night. "Landing gear engaged, Ironhide," Blaster was murmuring. "Beam locked on."

"Hold onta yer skidplates, mechs'n'femme, we're goin' down."

Flamestrike had survived bombing runs, but the shaking of the shuttle almost jarred her armor off its exoskeleton. She found herself clenching her dental plates so badly, her jaw servos protested.

The shuttle tipped left, then slightly to the right, the boosters cutting in half, then by another half. With a deep roar, the craft tilted backwards and she both heard and felt the impact of wheels on landing strip.

And then there was silence.

Some mech in the back set up a cheer which was quickly taken up by the other passengers, save for Flamestrike. To her, it was a rather well-exectuted landing, nothing to celebrate. The pilots had done what they had been sent to do. While Ironhide and Blaster ran through their post-flight diagnostics, Flamestrike stood up and began to rummage around in the overhead bin for her carry-on; the rest of her meagre belongings were currently sitting in the hold … which, by the sound of things, was being excavated.

"Opening hatch," she heard Blaster mutter. Behind her and several rows back, a pneumatic hiss and a rush of air told her just as much. It was then that the world of Earth came rushing into the shuttle. Flamestrike paused, her hands locked around the handle of her carry-on; a sweet, warm breeze blew through the hatch, bringing with it a myriad of scents and sounds.

"Welcome t'Earth," Ironhide announced, standing up and folding his arms over his boxy chest. "Step orderly now."

Tugging her luggage free, Flamestrike followed the other mechs down the ramp and out of the shuttle. As soon as her feet cleared the ramp, her optics caught sight of Autobot City in all its evening glory. Over a thousand points of light eminated from the massive installation, the roar of water over generators echoing in the darkness. The femme had just enough time to make out a shadowy figure standing in a glass-enclosed tower before being ushered into the building proper.

Just inside the City, the new arrivals were met by Ultra Magnus, the massive City Commander. A shorter, grey-colored mech stood by his side, holding what appeared to be room keys. The Commander made short work of his welcome speech, much to Flamestrike's relief. She was travel-weary and would've liked nothing more than to settle in her new quarters and make sense of everything. She also had to decide what her new alternative mode would be; when she had been picked for duty, she had been told that there would be some reformatting if your Cybertronian altmode was deemed too "alien" to provide acurate cover on Earth. Holding the form of a sleek, tri-wheeled sprintster, Flamestrike was one of those marked for change. Not that she minded; some of the mechs had protested, but it had to be done. She'd been told that officials would provide enough catelogues for her to choose from.

Patiently, she listened to the City Commander's explaination of the layout and was ready to take her key from the grey mech when Ultra Magnus added something to the end of his speech. "Now, I know that all of you would like to get some recharge time in before your formal orientation tomorrow, but there's a 'mixer' tonight in the gymnasium. It's an opportunity for you to get to know your comrades in a neutral setting. I encourage that you attend, but it's not mandatory. Bluestreak will lead you to the gym if you choose to go; I shall walk the rest to the soldiers' barracks."

"Are there gonna be femmes there?" some randy soul called out from the safety of the back. Ultra Magnus peered down at them from his lofty height, folding his blue and white arms over the great blue expanse of his chestplate. His huge steel blue optics narrowed.

"This is a mixed facility, and all of you will act according to your rank and your faction. Optimus Prime does not take transgressors lightly," he warned in a low tone that brooked no argument. There was an embarrassed suffle in the back; the City Commander nodded, effectively ending the conversation.

In twos or threes, the mechs began to disperse, only four of them taking the keys from the fresh-faced Bluestreak. Flamestrike waffled on the edge, indesisive. Ultra Magnus, taking her silence and non-movement for a decision, called the mechs to order and began to lead them to the elevators. With a grin, Bluestreak handed out the remaining keys. "Just follow me," he announced, launching into a long-winded history of Autobot City's founding and various tales of the Ark warriors – of which he was one. Having left her carry-on with the others' on a wide trolley and no one left to lead her upstairs, Flamestrike had no choice but to high-tail it after them.

The soldier in her appreciated the construction of the City; the agent in her remarked on the subtle faults. Bluestreak led them through the main bay and up into the administration level before taking a swift left. Two wide bay doors were thrown wide, letting the heavy pulse of many mechanical voices filter out into the hallway. The mechs went in eagerly enough, but Flamestrike was less enthusiastic. As she casually stepped through the doors, Bluestreak gently caught her upper arm. Quizically, she turned.

"I was to give this to you," he said, pulling a thin card from subspace. Puzzled, she took it, turning it over and above her head to read. It was nothing more than a temporary passkey to the comm tower. In response to her twisted lip components, Bluestreak grinned. "You're to meet with Comm Officer Solarflare tomorrow at 0800."

With a wave, he left her at the entrance, almost cavorting into the throng. Flamestrike pursed her lips, looking once more at the passkey. Was she being reassigned? There had been nothing to indicate such change – and she had been picked _because_ of her skills. A little more than disgruntled, the femme took one more look into the fray, swallowed her pride and stepped into what she would later learn was controlled chaos – City-style.

There were several representatives of the native top-species (humans) present. They merely nodded in her direction, some with pleasant smiles, before turning back to their servo-popping conversations with some Autobots. Others were up on a small jury-rigged stage on the opposite side, dancing with a few mechs and femmes. Music, loud and harsh to her audios, blasted from this area. Spoiler drooping, Flamestrike looked around for a place to sit. To her chagrin, there were few chairs and those that she managed to spot were already occupied. Slowly, she made a circuit of the room; at the end nearest the stage sat a long, lithe white and blue mech, feet propped up on a crate, an arm slung around the back of the chair to his left. As she neared, she saw that he was watching the action on the raised platform with a certain degree of amusement. Turning to follow his gaze, Flamestrike saw the object of his attention: a strange grey femme with massive wings was being dipped, spun and gyrated against with various levels of enthusiasm by a huge, stocky yellow mech. To this white-blue mech's right, a green mech with pleasant, soft features, leaned over and muttered something in his audios; the other mech tipped his head back and laughed, a low affair that nevertheless carried.

"Excuse me," she said to the white-blue. "Is this seat taken?"

The mech's optics flickered to the stage and up to her; his generous lip components quirked. "Apparently not." And he slung his arm off the chair back, tipping it towards her.

"Thank you. I'm Flamestrike, by the way."

The mech looked at her outstretched hand, then shook it, almost as if contact were an afterthought. "Mirage. This is Hound. You're one of the new arrivals, I take it."

"Just this evening." There was a roar from those gathered around the stage; Flamestrike looked up to see the grey femme being spun in a tight circle by the yellow mech, her wings fanning in and out with grace. "Who's that?" she asked, jerking a thumb.

"Flare," Mirage replied, shaking his head at her antics. "And Sunstreaker."

Across from him, the green mech Hound chuckled. "You better get up there, Raj. You know she'll want one dance with you."

The white-blue mech shook his helmed head and grinned ruefully. "I know. It was nice meeting you, Flamestrike." He stood with a grace and fluidity that surprised even her. With purposeful strides that took him into the heart of the crowd, Mirage reached the stage and held up one hand while gesturing to the side with the other. All too used to sudden changes in her environment, Flamestrike was the only one not to "ooh" when the lights blacked out, then slowly rose to a delicate dusky ambience.

"Showoff," she could hear quite plainly in the silence that followed the mood change. On-stage, the huge golden mech had his arms crossed; the grey femme smiled and reached down for the hand Mirage offered her. In one smooth motion, Mirage took her by the waist, spun her and planted her strange pyramidal feet on the dance floor.

"I take it they're a couple," Flamestrike found herself remarking as alien music filled her audios and Mirage and Flare were swallowed by the rest.

Hound grinned. "Very." He leaned across the empty space. "You don't dance, do you?"

Cocking her head to the side in a gesture that had Hound grinning even wider, she indicated the negative. The green mech shrugged. "Ah, well." He got up and scooted to the empty chair, stretching his legs out as far as they could go without being trampled upon. "What's your specialty?"

"Espionage."

"Not bad," he murmured in reply. "I'll have to introduce you to Bumblebee sometime. He could give you some pointers on how to maneuver around Earth."

Resettling her spoiler, Flamestrike nodded absently. Glancing at the green mech out of the corner of her optic, she pulled out the passkey. He seemed open enough. "Would you mind telling me why I have to see this comm officer tomorrow? I don't mean to sound rude, but I have nothing to do with communications."

Hound took one look at the thin plas-card and chuckled. "Oh, Flare sees all the femmes who are stationed here. She's senior, you see."

Flamestrike's brow ridge creased. She looked at the card and then across the dance floor to where the grey, winged femme had her head on Mirage's shoulder, her charcoal lips moving softly. "_That's_ Solarflare?" How could they expect her to respect and honor the requests of a senior who seemed to enjoy publicly humiliating herself?

Hound leaned back, eying her. "Yeah – Flare, Solarflare?"

"I never had a use for nicknames."

The mech's optics narrowed shrewdly, drastically altering the pleasant set to his facial planes. Flamestrike was momentarily taken aback by this sudden show of proprietariness. "Let me tell you something," he began calmly, trying to alter the disapproval in his vocalizer by forcing some gentleness. "We were all deep in it on Cybertron; we're still deep in it here. But every now and then, a mech's gotta turn himself or herself loose. You'll find that out soon enough. Don't judge Flare too quickly by what you see here. Meet her face to face and come back to me later."

"Sure," she replied, getting up with a soft good-bye before exiting the chaos that was the gymnasium.


	2. The Meeting

Chapter Two

Her things were stacked in neat order by the simple berth by the wall. Flamestrike was rather impressed: she'd been expecting a cubicle; apparently Autobot City was more generous in its sleeping arrangements than she previously thought. Besides the berth, there was a low couch, a viewer, a comm desk with Internet access (whatever that was), a small Energon dispenser and a shelf. Checking her chronometer, she found she had about two hours to arrange her belongings before catching a quick recharge.

As she was putting some datapads inside the desk's drawers, she noticed a thin 'pad already sitting in the bottom. Having found no mention of the promised catalogue of altmodes, she determined that this was it. Pulling out the chair, the brown and flame-colored femme settled herself and was unceremoniously launched into a massive commercial for human automotives of all shapes, sizes and colors. Each vehicle was punctuated by bold lettering on a black background: The New 2000 Chevrolet Cavalier! The Classic Ford Mustang – GT!

Disgusted, Flamestrike shut the datapad down and stuck it in the very back of the desk. If this is was all she had to choose from, she'd rather slip into a turbofox's hide than be a running advertisement. Re-checking her chronometer, the hour decided her next action: rest. Easing onto the bunk chestplate-first, Flamestrike grabbed the connecting cord, inserted it into her receiving port and slowly shut down.

* * *

The new hour arrived more quickly than she'd imagined. Rolling over, Flamestrike pulled the cord and hopped down, almost stumbling over a piece of gear she'd forgotten to stow on her way to the dispenser. Though she would be civil and polite in front of the comm officer, she knew that last night's moment of prejudice would be hard to shake. After she went over her armor with a clean rag and wiped her optics, Flamestrike checked her personal subspace for the pass-key and left the room. 

Shift-changes were in full-swing, but Flamestrike was used to negotiating in difficult circumstances. Politely querying the location of the comm tower, she flowed with the tide until she reached the elevator and rode up with five mechs to the tenth floor. The comm room was at the end of the hallway; flashing her pass to the guard on duty, Flamestrike took a step back as the doors slid into their niches with a faint pneumatic hiss. Two rows of five mechs and femmes were lined up on either side of a wide hall, their digits flying over their keypads, deciphering, decoding, watching and listening.

Flamestrike paused, and the doors slid shut behind her. She could see nothing of the grey femme; upon her arrival, she'd seen the massive tower, but where was the entrance? A slim mech, his armor too light for active combat, approached her, a clipboard in one hand, a stylus tucked over one helm-horn. "Can I help you?"

She flicked over the key. "Yes, I'm to meet Comm Officer Solarflare."

The mech gave it the barest of glances. "The tube's over there," he said, gesturing to the bare wall over his shoulder. "Solarflare is expecting you – but just in case she's doing work, let me know. Don't pull anything," he added, pulling down his stylus and tapping it against his board.

Don't pull anything? Flamestrike cocked a brow ridge, but shrugged. She wasn't the kind to pull things out of sheer curiosity. "I don't mean to be rude, but _how_?"

The mech glanced over his shoulder. "There's a panel along the wall; press it and the ladder'll come down." He turned to look over the shoulder of an orange-tinted femme, writing things down. "Oh, and welcome to the City."

Flamestrike thanked him and edged around the chairs that were swiveling back and forth, avoiding the passage of datapads across the way. She located the panel easily enough; she should have seen it sooner. Maybe she was still tired from all the travel; she hadn't had more than one small cup of Energon. A faint whine, punctuated by a thin growl, heralded the ladder's descent. A rounded panel in the ceiling depended and retracted, followed shortly by the thick rungs of the ladder. Light blossomed above; setting hand and foot on the rungs, Flamestrike hauled herself topside.

The grey femme was framed by the early light streaming through the Plexiglas windows, her wings folded against her back. She turned as Flamestrike scrabbled over the edge. Despite those massive feet, she made the crossing towards the other femme quietly enough. "Hello! You must be Flamestrike. I'm Solarflare, senior femme."

For someone with a muted color-scheme, the senior femme was cheery enough, Flamestrike noted, looking down at the long onyx talons that protruded from Solarflare's digit-tips. Gingerly, she took the hand, preparing herself to leave with a few puncture wounds – and was surprised when the other femme's grip belied her worries.

"I'm sorry I can't offer you a seat," Solarflare continued, releasing Flamestrike's hand. "But, as you can see, it's a two-mech operation up here." She gestured to the huge orange chair that hung in the center of the room, suspended by a crane-like arm that was bolted to the floor. Flamestrike followed the sweep of her arm as it went around the room; there was one other piece of equipment here: a small workstation off to her left, with a large poster taped next to it. Curious, she peered at it, and then jerked back. Solarflare gave a short laugh. "You'd be surprised at how many people neglect to honor those rules," and she ruefully rubbed her neck.

"Anyway! What I have to say is pretty simple – not really necessary, but Optimus feels that additional support should come from me, so it's what I do. You should have received the ground rules before you left; orientation will be at ten-hundred, where you'll receive a short course in human interaction. After that, you're to report to Prowl for your assignments."

Flamestrike looked down at the sheaf of paper Solarflare passed over, outlining the very things she was speaking of.

"Also," the joyful femme continued, "I was told that you were marked for reformatting. If I can help with your choice, feel free to ask. Prowl will be your commanding officer, but I do encourage you to come to me with any problems that you might have. Any questions?" And she cocked her head to the side in a gesture that was so familiar to Flamestrike.

The look on Solarflare's face slowly began to dissolve the dislike the brown and flame-colored femme had managed to build up. Privately, she wondered if the green mech, Hound, had passed along her criticisms.

Looking down at the paper, Flamestrike made up her mind. "Actually … I didn't like any of the modes offered in the catalogue."

The black, tri-fold crest on the femme's brow quirked at the same time her charcoal lip components did. "Unfortunately, the motor companies pay us a bundle to include those outrageous ads. Believe me, I wouldn't touch them with a ten-foot pole, but it helps defer a lot of the costs of maintaining the City." Her wings flicked. "Might I see your altmode?"

Stuffing the paper into subspace, Flamestrike complied, settling on all three of her wheels and peering up at Solarflare from her window sensors.

"Yes, that would be a little difficult getting through the brush," Solarflare murmured, completing her walk-around. Flamestrike transformed, settling her spoiler. The grey femme walked over to her comm station and brought up the image of a stout automotive. "The SUV is probably your best bet," she mused, half to herself, "but I just can't see you as this."

Walking over, Flamestrike had to agree. She couldn't keep her Cybertron altmode, but she'd be damned if she had to go through the war as one of those! "Is there anything else?" she asked, trying to lean over Solarflare's shoulder, but getting held back by those large wings. "I'm sorry," she interrupted as Solarflare's mouth opened, "but I have to inquire – what are _you_?"

The grey femme stepped back and transformed; a pair of bright, diamond-shaped golden optics peered up at her from her lower position. "An eagle," came the words from a black beak. "Harpy, to be precise – but I can see that means nothing to you." And the beak's malleable edges quirked before sweeping back into its normal position between the femme's shoulder struts. A thoughtful look came over her white facial planes, and she pulled out her chair. "Here, sit."

Confused, Flamestrike did as she was bid; Solarflare leaned across her and tapped out a sequence of commands. Instantly, the screen was filled with a list of Earth fauna. "Why don't you look through these?" the other femme offered. "The build team might not be happy with the complexity, but you might find something that suits you better than a promotional vehicle. No decals!" And she laughed before turning away and going back to the front (or back, Flamestrike couldn't really tell – the room was vaguely hexagonal and completely paneled by windows).

As Flamestrike sifted through the various species, she could hear Solarflare in the background, talking, it seemed, to herself. Pushing the femme's voice to the back of her awareness, Flamestrike concentrated on the animals. She found the Harpy Eagle and was silently impressed with its magnificence. But a bird would be of no use to her – she, who spent most of her time creeping through alleyways, slinking through tight holes no mech on four wheels could manage to squeak past.

Most creatures failed to hold her interest, and she passed them by until she found herself lingering on the lion. It was a powerful-looking predator, with the size, shape and build that would work well in her field. Keeping that in its own window, Flamestrike reached the bottom: **MISC MYTHICAL** read the heading; **GREEK ROMAN EGYPTIAN MAYAN** … were the subgroups. "_Mythical", huh?_ she thought and clicked the first creature under those headings that caught her optic, a "gryphon".

"It would be nice," she heard Solarflare comment, "to have another winged femme to keep me company." Flamestrike turned in her chair, looking up at the other femme. "The jets and planes don't have the same mentality as I do," she added a bit wistfully, looking at the image on the screen. "Do you like it?"

Turning back around, Flamestrike considered the implications. "Not really. It's not even a real creature. And I'm used to rolling on wheels."

"You get the hang of it pretty quickly," the other femme told her, patting her on the spoiler. "I can help you."

"But the practicality …"

Solarflare leaned on the console, looking thoughtful and, if Flamestrike was any judge of expression, a little crafty. "You know, there's no reason why we shouldn't have more animal-based 'bots around here. That would certainly give the Predacons and Terrorcons a run for their money!" She gave a little _whoot_ and rubbed her taloned hands together at the very thought.

Mentally, Flamestrike shook her head; Solarflare wasn't getting it. She had little concern for how many of what each side had – her issue was the usefulness of the form, how well it would serve her in the war. Sure, it was pretty and unique, but what good would it do? "I'll think about it," she told Solarflare, pushing the chair back and getting up. "I think I need to attend orientation now?"

Solarflare glanced up at a clock set above her console and nodded. "It'll be in the gym; I think you know how to get there?"

Flamestrike nodded; she wasn't above asking for directions, either. "Thank you for your time," she told Solarflare, and began to walk back towards the tube when the femme's voice called out:

"I hope my actions last night didn't mar your opinion of me."

Startled, Flamestrike wheeled about. "I –"

Soft sympathy was etched onto the femme's facial planes. "Don't worry about it. I'm not much into female companionship myself …" She gave a wry quirk of her lips.

She could either be genuine or very sly, Flamestrike considered, using reverse psychology to get her to like the grey femme. In the end, the same quick thinking that had saved her tailpipe in the field made up her mind, once and for all, about the senior femme. "No, I'm sorry," she said at last, "I shouldn't have judged you so quickly. I guess the war did it to me; I immediately look for strong authority."

"The war has changed us all," Solarflare murmured, her brow ridge low and the set of her optics reflecting an old sadness Flamestrike would never know about. "Take care, and call me if you need me." She turned her back, her wings metal pinions rustling gently at her hips.

Arriving early, Flamestrike took a seat nearest the front. The stage that had been used for dancing just last night had been converted: three easels and a projection screen were being set up by a yellow Minibot and a human male who was wearing a curious suit of Autobot armor. The Minibot nodded in her direction before easing a large poster onto the stand in the center.

In a matter of moments, Flamestrike's shuttle companions filed in, taking seats further from the front and organizing themselves into tiny cliques.

"Good morning!" the male in the exosuit exclaimed cheerfully. "My name is Spike Witwicky, and this is Bumblebee."

Flamestrike straightened her spoiler; the espionage agent Hound had mentioned was _this_ very fellow?

"We're going to keep this as short and concise as possible, so if you could direct your attention to the screen?"

Settling herself, Flamestrike found herself launched into a quick history of the City and the Autobots' relationship with humanity. Tied into the film were a strand of news clips and related media, outlining the graciousness the humans had for the Autobots; but intermixed were pictures of dead bodies and terror, clips where the sounds of screams echoed in the background as Autobots raced to their allies' rescue. On that sobering note, Bumblebee raised the lights and the screen was pulled back into its recess in the ceiling.

"You'll all be exposed to things like this, both good and bad," the yellow Minibot informed them. "Around me, you can see the outlines of the ground rules. Any questions? We'll answer what we can."

"Fraternizing!" a mech in the very back called out with a hoot.

Flamestrike stuck her arm over the back of her chair and leveled a most astounded glare at the offending mech. How in Primus' name had this one gotten the green light to come here?

On-stage, Bumblebee and Spike exchanged a look; the Minibot folded his arms and opened his mouth to speak when an authoritative voice cut through the sparkling mech's giggle: "We've no objections if you wish to find a companion, but it's not to interfere with your work."

From the gym door, a tall figure in black and white was striding towards them, his chevron as red as the blood Flamestrike had seen pouring from the humans' veins. He stopped at the mech's row and favored him with a tight-lipped stare. "If this is the first thing I am to hear from you, Engineer Turnout, then perhaps I will inform Optimus Prime that he should seek another."

Green and white Turnout's brow ridge danced smartly above his optics and he slowly shook his head in the negative. "'No', what?" the black and white pressed, reaching out and gripping the back of the mech's chair with his right hand.

"No, sir," Turnout muttered.

"Then apologize to Agent Flamestrike for your salacious remark," the officer ordered, pointing in Flamestrike's direction.

Optics burning with fury, Turnout's apology was almost inaudible, but apparently the officer was satisfied. "You're dismissed to your duty officers – except for you, agent." But Flamestrike wasn't rising as fast as her servos could manage, as the others were doing; rather, she remained seated, still half-turned.

"Thanks, Prowl," Bumblebee called down from the stage.

The black and white gave a curt nod before walking to the front. Immediately, Flamestrike got to her feet as the officer approached. This close, he really wasn't that tall – only a few marks above her; looking at him, his facial planes seemed to be set in a permanent, stoic mien. "Sir," she saluted. Prowl nodded, hands behind his back.

"If you'll come with me, agent?" He gestured for her to follow as they walked across the gym floor. Prowl paused at a door and opened it, indicating that she enter first. He flicked a light on as she crossed the threshold, revealing a rather musty office with a desk and two chairs. Prowl sniffed and took the chair on the far side of the desk; without asking, she seated herself on the other. "Not exactly my office, but it'll do," the officer murmured, setting a thick finger to the desk's dusty surface, his professional mien broken by a grimace of disgust. When he looked up at her, the old expression was back. "I hear you have the best record in your sector, is that correct, Agent Flamestrike?"

"Yes, sir." Elaboration would come as requested, not before. Officers didn't like to be preempted in their queries, nor did this one seem to like braggarts.

"That is good to hear. While Megatron has moved most of his troops to the outer reaches, he's left two subgroups here to terrorize the humans – and us – regularly. They are not of the usual breed, these Predacons and Terrorcons," Prowl mused, rocking slightly back in his chair, his optics never leaving hers. "They slink and crawl as no Decepticon I have ever seen. They have burrowed deep into the woods, foothills and mountains of this world, particularly this continent, primarily because it is where we are located. But we have found them elsewhere. No matter," he continued, waving his hand. "Solarflare has let me know that you were considering an animal-based altmode?"

That this bit of information reached Prowl's audios so quickly failed to surprise Flamestrike. However, she was a little annoyed that the eagle-femme was trying to press her into sprouting feathers. "Actually, sir, I'm not quite certain that animal is the way I wish to go."

"Yet the vehicles provided did not meet your satisfaction?" There was no mockery or accusation in the mech's tone. It was rather neutral.

Mentally, Flamestrike groaned. Was she going to be pressed into a form she would grow to hate? "No, sir. I found them … gaudy."

"As do I," he conceded. "But, I have to agree with Solarflare's comment about the usefulness of an animal form for ground-work. However," he added, "the choice is yours. But it must be made quickly." Digging into a subspace pocket, he pulled forth a datapad. "This is your schedule for the next two Earth-weeks. We have no need for a mission at the moment; consider this time to ease into life in the City. But, if the need arises, I will call for you. You'll report to the training room tomorrow morning for your first sparring session." He held out the pad, which Flamestrike took, trying not to admire the shape of his digits. Now that she was truly face-to-face, he was rather pleasant to look at. "Tell me your impression of our senior."

Flamestrike's optics snapped up from her perusal. "Sir?" His nod was all he would give her; he knew she had heard him. "Odd, at first," she allowed, "but she likes me – I think."

"Glad to hear it," he replied, stretching his frame against the chair before getting up. "By 23:00, I need to know your choice of form," he told her over his shoulder, exiting.

Flamestrike studied the pad all the way up to her berthing level, trying not to be drawn into conceding to the senior femme's wishes. But the more she thought about it, the less she could deny the senior's common sense … that, and she was growing increasingly used to the concept. _23:00?_ she murmured to herself, powering up her comm unit. _Almost a whole day …_

But she knew any further pondering was futile; her mind was made up, albeit encouraged by two other people. _A gryphon …_


	3. The Change

Chapter Three

The cafeteria of Autobot City was buzzing early in the morning; however, it wasn't too hard to find a single table. Flamestrike grabbed a mug of refined oil from the barista, and, plucking a copy of this morning's newsletter, pushed her way through the gabbling crowd to a remote corner of the room. Prowl had not been in residence when she dropped off her reformatting request in the evening, but there was a message waiting for her when she returned to her quarters saying that her new form had been approved and she was to report to the medbay at the end of the week, along with follow-up orders to see Solarflare.

Taking a sip of her oil, (which was very good) Flamestrike perused the sheaf of paper. Many millennia ago, when she had led the life of a civilian and had been dutifully employed as a runner for the Autobot Council, she'd received many such newsletters. This was informal, unlike the running text that constantly scrawled along the cafeteria walls: there were announcements for clubs, reading groups, sports teams – for human and Autobot alike. There was even a personals' section, which managed to elicit more than one giggle from the brown and flame-colored femme.

"Mind if I grab this chair?" a feminine voice queried across the table. Flamestrike set paper and mug down and looked up at the optic-blinding pink femme. _Now, how on Cybertron did _she_ stay low?_ she wondered.

"Not at all," Flamestrike replied, reaching out for the other's hand in greeting. The pink femme smiled and shook it.

"I'm Arcee. You're …?"

"Flamestrike. Infiltration."

Someone called for Arcee, but the femme shushed them, pulling the chair out and seating herself opposite Flamestrike. "You arrived yesterday, didn't you?" When she nodded, Arcee gestured over her shoulder. "Want to join us?"

Flamestrike peered over the pink femme's shoulder at the gaggle congregating at one of the larger tables. Three smiled, one waved. "I'd love to, but I have to head up to the gymnasium for training practice."

Arcee frowned. "That's too bad. Say, you could join us this evening. We're going out to Memphis – it's a human city not far from here."

Admittedly, it was a tempting offer, but one that could be taken up at another time. There was still her need to walk around the grounds and get to know the facility better. "I wish I could but I can't." Arcee parted her lip components to take the dismissal in stride when she suddenly flinched, deftly covering it up so that there was the slightest tic of her right cheek plate. With a quick goodbye, the femme took the extra chair and walked back across the way she'd come, leaving Flamestrike a little more than perplexed.

Checking her chronometer, Flamestrike decided that she should start heading up to the gym; settling her chair against the table, she recycled the newsletter and returned her mug to the barista. On her way out, she noticed Solarflare, Mirage, Hound and a red-grey Minibot sharing a tall pitcher of Energon towards the front. Glancing over her spoiler, Flamestrike's gaze settled on Arcee, then back towards the quartet. Puzzled, she shrugged and walked on.

Despite the secretive, stealthy nature of her job, Flamestrike actually liked to fight. For her, it was the connection between her cortex and her limbs, the oneness one felt when executing a difficult move, or set of motions. Her trainer was a tall, lithe mech who was painted red, purple and blue, and wore his colors with a cool sense of humor. For that week, Wreckspot drilled her in all manners of combat, from hand-to-hand, to improvisational, where they would go out onto the field that surrounded the City, and he would basically have her scramble about, snatching whatever litter was strewn on the grounds and attack him. As the week drew to a close, Wreckspot left her with instructions to return to him when she had mastered her new form. Flamestrike shook his hand and trekked off towards the medbay, walking slowly, remembering how her body felt in this shape.

* * *

The Chief Medical Officer, a stocky white mech by the name of Ratchet, ruled his bay with a fist of iron. He leveled his optics at her from under a severe grey chevron when she passed through the huge doors. "You're Flamestrike, right?" he asked, not wasting any time with frivolous greetings. "First Aid, grab the schematics. Up on the platform, girl. I want you to look over these plans and let me know if you want us to change anything." 

As she settled herself, Flamestrike realized that if she had any misgivings about her new form, it wouldn't do her any good to voice them. She took the datapad from the other red and white mech, whose visored optics winked at her over his face plate. The transformation process seemed to be quite smooth, and she got to keep her original colors.

"We'll be adding a subspace pocket here," First Aid told her, leaning across to point to her right side, "for your pistol. Your tail will be detachable, as requested, with the proper flaming components."

Flamestrike smiled. There was a good reason why she renamed herself the way she had! First Aid continued: "Seeing as we don't have that many animal-based warriors, we had to borrow some of Solarflare's wing schematics – but you'll have one slight advantage over her. Instead of boosters, we'll be outfitting you with a pair of anti-grav generators. They'll be located here," and he pointed to her lower back. "Any questions?"

Flamestrike scrolled the plans once more. Things seemed fairly straightforward as to her armor protection: while she would be losing a lot on her arms and legs, her chest area would be reinforced. "Could I make one change?" Across the way, Ratchet huffed, but First Aid looked at her inquiringly. "It's just one little thing. Could my optics be green?" While she had no qualms about her war-formed body, the one thing she'd always wanted as a runner was different-colored optic-glass. Many of the Elite had had yellow, purple or green glass, rather than the uniform Autobot blue. It was something Flamestrike had promised herself that she'd get done once she saved up enough credits.

Ratchet made a sound deep in his throat, but First Aid smiled. "I don't see why not."

Flamestrike beamed, the first true smile she'd allowed herself in a long time, and stretched herself out on the table. Before they shut her down, her last conscious thought was about flying.

-------------------------

Was it her imagination, or did the wind taste differently? _Surely you have changed, Flamestrike, if you claim you can taste the wind!_ she chuckled to herself. Long talons dug into the rock upon which she perched, her quarters raised, wings half-spread, her fan-tail balancing out this long, lithe new body. When she had come out of the three-day reformatting process, Flamestrike had been amazed at how quickly she'd taken to her new form. First Aid had joked that they cheated a bit, and programmed a bit of feline and raptor into her body's central processor.

"Hopefully she doesn't go primitive on us," she'd heard Doc Ratchet murmuring in a concerned tone of voice when he thought she wasn't paying attention. "Avian alone is bad enough with Flare, but cat _and_ bird? _Primus_."

Somewhat appalled, Flamestrike now wondered if that is what they had indeed done to her processor; her sense of balance was never more acute, nor was her other senses. The metallic wings she'd believed so cumbersome on Solarflare were a Primus-send: her pinions caught the breeze's changes, "scented" vibrations in the air. These so-called instincts were quickly becoming superior to her old, battle-honed talents.

The bell sounded and Flamestrike leapt off the ridge, digging her claws into the rock, spinning her hindquarters to the left in order to avoid a quick staccato burst of fake laser fire. Autobot City's obstacle course, located outside of the city proper, had been built for four-wheeled altmodes, with occasional overhangs for the aerial-minded. Four types of terrain were arranged in a manner that appeared to be haphazard, but in reality, it provided troops with the opportunity to practice sudden changes in their environment.

Automated guns followed Flamestrike as she ran, dove and rolled through the first terrain with its paved "road" with huge chunks missing to simulate a battleground highway. With the wind singing in her ventilators, she neatly dodged a saw-arm with its accompanying dull-bladed darts. Skipping onto a rock, she snagged the first flag in her beak and tucked it into subspace before bounding off to the second terrain of open plain.

Too experienced to be smug, it was hard not to quell the pride as she practically floated through the third area, with its soggy marshland and whipping wind. With that flag in subspace, she mounted the last – arctic chill, with fake wind and snow streaming at her from four powerful generators in the artificial canyon walls. The goal was to see how well she could manage to survive without relying on her robotmode; with these talons and claws, it was easier for her than those who ran on tires, and Flamestrike was soon able to see the wisdom of Solarflare and Prowl's choice.

Just as she was about to clear the last hurdle, a gust of wind slammed into her from the right – and with it, a powerful jab to her newly-minted flanks. With a keen that surprised her audios, Flamestrike yelped and rolled through the artificial snow before slamming into the ice-coated wall. Wide-optic'ed, she saw a shape amongst the snow, a figure without a true body. She had enough time to register an arm raised to strike before she leapt to her feet, transforming and catching the arm in mid-swing. She was rewarded with a mild grunt before the invisible creature rebounded; her arm was snagged and a nanoclick later, she was sailing through the air to land in a snow bank.

_What? Where!?_

"Cut the turbines."

Shaking snow from her helm, Flamestrike stood up as the storm cleared and saw two figures walking towards her: Prowl and Mirage; the latter held a bright red flag in his right hand.

"I must say, she made that look far too easy," the white and blue mech complemented with a smile.

Prowl nodded, extending his hand to help her up. Tiny flamelets rose from the top of Flamestrike's head in mild embarrassment, but she took the proffered hand regardless. Rising to her feet, she slapped snow and ice from her armor. "What _was_ that?"

Mirage tipped a thumb towards his chestplate. "Me."

Flamestrike, despite herself, gawped. "You? Invisibility components are extremely rare …"

Prowl patted his hip plates reflectively. "This is probably why Mirage is the only one to have them." The other mech shrugged, winked and before Flamestrike's optics, faded from reality, leaving the red flag behind. "Now, Agent, tell me, what did you learn?"

"To expect the unexpected," she replied dutifully, filing such a talent away for future use.

To her surprise, Prowl smiled. "And to request that we test you above normal next time. Deferment to authority has its place, but if you know what your limits are, do not hesitate to try and test them next time. I wasn't going to send Mirage after you until later, but you proved too capable on the level we ran you at. Elita-1 was correct in her assumption that we needed your talents, and I concur with her reports. You are amazing."

Despite herself, she flushed, a tinge of pink highlighting her grey facial plates. There was no awe in Prowl's words, as there might be from someone of lesser rank. It was matter-of-fact – and true.

"Thank you, sir," she demurred.

"Prowl," was all he said, inclining his head and walking off.


	4. The Plan

Chapter Four

Friends were a luxury that Flamestrike had weaned herself off of as the years of war dragged on. Certainly, she had companions and people she trusted to pull her spoiler out of harm's way, but a true friend? Most of them were long gone on to Primus when the Decepticons stormed Iacon in the fatal strike that took the life of Sentinel Prime. Either they were too slow, in the wrong place, or succumbed to desperation – runners, intellectuals, honor guards … trying to stave off the hordes of evil Guardians.

Her creator, Twilight, had been one of the many to die that day, trying to defend the University. Flamestrike had been one of the lucky ones, fortunate enough to make it to the tunnels and into hiding. In the days that followed, she had managed to scrape together enough Energon to make it to one of the Autobot revolution camps; there she had seen Optimus Prime and his consort, the fierce warrioress, Elita-1 make a speech. Strength of intellect and vons of running had her raising her hand when the call for soldiers was announced. She was placed under Elita's command, one of a handful of elite warrior femmes which included the indomitable Chromia. From there, she honed her skills delving deep into enemy territory, usually one or more bombs strapped to her sides – otherwise, she infiltrated and learned, burning rubber to spy another day.

Over the vons, the naïve runner had been replaced by the agent and soldier, a veneer that threatened to never come off. That was, until she came to Earth.

She would be the first to admit that she believed Solarflare's uncouth actions and seemingly flippant attitude were restrictive. Later, she would find that it was an attitude almost universally shared by residents of the City. Light-years from the main war, the Ark warriors (and later, their reinforcements) were able to unwind, and develop skills and ways of coping that their Cybertron-bound fellows were unable to cultivate. And, perhaps, it made them even more determined – and deadly. Certainly, for some, this was all too true – from what Flamestrike witnessed of "the Twins", as the massive red and gold mechs Sideswipe and Sunstreaker were called.

After a month on Earth, Flamestrike tried to make friends with the pink femme Arcee, only to find her presence grating. It wasn't that Arcee was unpleasant, or a terrible soldier – she was neither – but somehow, the gryphonic femme found that she couldn't empathize with wheeled vehicles anymore. That, and she chanced upon a conversation Arcee was having with a few Paradron medic femmes. Called over to their table, she had sat down and was thrown tail-first into a private bashing of the senior femme, Solarflare. Apparently, as she was to learn, the two had a mild grudge betwixt them, stemming from an incident last year when Arcee unknowingly pulling the grey eagle's comm-plug, causing her to go into shock from information overload.

"Didn't you apologize?" Flamestrike had asked when no one brought the obvious up.

Arcee gazed at her with a mixture of pity and confusion. "I tried, but her screams brought the CMO up and he started to dress me down in front of the Chief Comm Officer, Blaster, and Ultra Magnus." She gave an eloquent shrug. "After that, I decided it was worthless to try and be her friend. She was too busy with that spy of hers and her little clique to care."

"She's the Ark favorite," one of the other femmes, a red-gold glider named Strata, had piped up. "The mechs of the star cruiser will bend over backwards for her. I've seen it."

Pathfinder, a blue and purple with red trim, nodded. "She carries those wings of hers like a human ruler and a cape. I see her sitting atop the Comm Tower like she owned it – and in altmode!"

If she hadn't met Solarflare that first day, Flamestrike was certain she'd be inclined to accept the other femmes' opinions. Certainly, Flare had her moments, what the Ark warriors called her "mother hen mentality", but, deep inside, she was more like Flamestrike – unused to female-minded companionship. In this, the brown and flame-colored gryphoness found that she could sympathize.

After that conversation, Flamestrike politely avoided their company and spent more and more of her time with Solarflare, learning the ins and outs of her new altmode – which included chucking herself off of various high-points of the City. When questioned about the legitimacy of these exercises, Solarflare chuckled and explained that _her_ mentor, the jet Powerglide, had taught her the same way – and look what she could do now! (After seeing the grey femme somersault into a perfect transformation, Flamestrike was secretly impressed, and even sought out the mech in question.)

In short time, the two had become friends, with the inclination towards great friendship. Which was why, at this moment, they were practicing beating the ever-loving slag out of each other with pugel sticks, under the feral gaze of Sunstreaker.

"We're not powdering our faces, ladies," the golden mech barked, pacing their tight circle with large, deliberate steps. "Flare – slaggit, no, Flame – no, FLARE. Fraggit!" he roared so that they dropped their sticks and looked at him as one. "Someone's getting a name change, and I vote the newbie."

Across from her, Solarflare smiled sweetly. "How about 'grey one' and 'brown one', Sunshine?"

Flamestrike resisted the impulse to titter, knowing that she had no standing with this war machine. It was good to feel that way, though. Stoicism had its place on the battlefield, but not here.

Sunstreaker leveled those eerie, feral optics on the grey femme, and then on Flamestrike, who, despite herself, took a step back. "How about 'get back to work'?" he suggested coldly, gesturing with one thick yellow hand. Flamestrike watched the shift of the other femme's facial planes and saw that she was biting back an oral retort. Slowly, she turned and lifted her stick to square off. With a small smile, Flamestrike lifted hers, and the soft beatings began anew.

* * *

Long black fingers tapped purposefully on the railing before their owner turned away. Prowl walked back to the small table in the observatory above the gymnasium and reshuffled his datapads, waiting for the others to arrive. Hopefully, the assessments of both he and Elita-1 would not prove misleading.

With a light hiss, the double doors slid back, revealing Optimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, and Magnus' right-hand, Springer. Immediately, the green triplechanger made for the railing and peered down at the fast and furious mock-combat. He whistled low through his helm-vents. "Not bad. The brown one has more control, though. She's the uber-agent?"

Prowl gestured. "Your seats, gentlemen?" When they were settled, Optimus at the head of the small table, Prowl at the end, the former second-in-command answered the air commander's query. "Yes, she is."

Ultra Magnus, the commander who had replaced Prowl in terms of rank here in the City, leaned forward. "By no means am I questioning your judgment, Prowl, but what makes her suitable for the infiltration of the Predacon facility?"

As always, the black and white cruiser was prepared. He took up the appropriate pads and passed them to the three. "As you can see, Flamestrike comes with a near-perfect history of kills, and a perfect infiltration record. She is quick, agile, and her form has been specially-designed to combat those of the Terrorcons and Predacons."

Quietly observing the actions below, Optimus Prime spoke up. "She has one of the best times on the course, I see. All in altmode?"

"For the most part," the cruiser replied. "During her first run-through, she demurred on her skill-level and I had to send Mirage in earlier than I wanted to."

Ultra Magnus raised his pad. "It says here that the counter-intelligence agent described her skill as uncanny."

Prowl nodded. "High, and unlikely, praise from Mirage." He didn't add that the Ligier was slightly affronted at the possibility that this femme would be better than he, with his high-priced gadgetry and time-honed hunting skills.

"Indeed," Optimus confirmed when Magnus turned his huge, questioning optics to the Autobot leader. "This mission is supposed to be low-key, a simple in and out job, as I understand it. The risk factor is high enough to challenge her, but to pose no direct threat."

"And I am sending Windcharger to tail her and to provide backup as necessary," Prowl added.

"Windcharger?" Springer asked, his grey facial planes twisted as he tried to place the name. "Oh – the impatient one."

Prowl suppressed a sigh. He was professional enough to accept the change in command, as well as the additional troops, but even he had to (privately) admit that things had been much easier when Earth held only the Ark warriors. None of this second-guessing. "Windcharger has improved over the years. He is perfectly capable of standing long watches. He is also fast and light enough to maneuver in the woodlands."

Optimus' presence was a mere formality these days. Now, the people who needed to be impressed the most were towering white, blue and red Magnus, and his green flyboy, Springer. "I'll take your word for it," Springer said, getting up to stand at the rail.

"And she'll be ready in five days?" Magnus queried, studying the information on the pad judiciously.

Something foreign trickled into Prowl's logic center, and it took him a nanoclick longer than usual to identify the emotion: he was on the verge of second-guessing himself. Usually, no one questioned his tactical choices (Red Alert notwithstanding); he had the privilege of being unerring in his opinions, and those being readily accepted. There was the possibility that Magnus, in his new position of City Commander, was taking a more jaundiced view of the war, now that the main branch of Decepticon forces were in space: off Cybertron and Earth. However, scouting reports had Megatron's forces gathering up for a large strike on their homeworld, which, in turn, prompted the building of the two moonbases.

In short, Magnus was not in the mood for backing long-shots, even if they came with Prowl's seal of approval.

The black and white did not proclaim what others might have in the heat of the moment ("She's ready _now_."); rather, he nodded. "I've personally overseen her training regimen, Commander. She will be ready."

Satisfied on the outside, Springer and Ultra Magnus bade Prowl and Prime farewell, and left the observatory. Once they were gone, and the doors shut, Optimus stood up and walked to the railing. "And how does Flamestrike feel?"

Looking down at the two femmes, now sitting on benches, laughing and rubbing at their armor with large, fluffy towels, Prowl gave an eloquent shrug. "When I proposed the mission to her, she seemed eager – almost overly so. She gave no indication that it was above – or beneath – her. She has confidence in her skill, but completely lacks hubris."

At that moment, Solarflare looked up, spied them, and waved. Beside her, Flamestrike followed her friend's gaze; there was a moment's hestitation, and then she, too, waved. Optimus inclined his head, as did Prowl. Flamestrike's optics rested a little longer than her friend's, and she had to be prodded back into conversation.

"If she can help remove all Decepticon taint from this world, than I have no qualms," Prime commented quietly, looking more worn and drawn than Prowl had ever seen his leader. "Keep me updated on her progress, Prowl." With a clap on the back, Prime left the cruiser alone in the observatory.

"I wouldn't try to impress them," came a low, cultured voice from the ether.

"Who said I was trying to impress anyone?" he retorted calmly, not even turning around from his louging position on the rail.

"I saw your face – Magnus got to you."

"I'd rather not hear words of disseent from you, Mirage."

A neon-orange cube emerged from thin air, bringing with it the lithe Ligier. "Hey, Prime asked me to observe. I'm telling you what I saw."

"Them, not me."

Mirage shrugged. "It's all the same to me."

Down below, the two femmes were hanging up their gear and leaving the facility. Prowl watched them go: two avian femmes, each walking with a grace so similar to the other. He'd ruminate on the theory that the form made the person later; for now, he had other, more pressing, matters to attend. "You can go now."

Beside him, Mirage chuckled, then faded. A slight stirring of air told the former 2IC that the Ligier had boosted the rail and landed with narry a sound onto the padded floor below.


	5. The Mission

Chapter Five

After an extensive session with Wreckspot the next day, Flamestrike reported to Commander Prowl's office for her final meeting before the infiltration run tomorrow. Mid-afternoon sunlight streamed through the high windows of the tactician's workplace as she entered; dust motes danced in the holographic stream that was coming from the small projector on Prowl's desk. The Minibot who was to be her backup, Windcharger, sat in the first of two chairs in front of the black and white. He turned as the pneumatic doors announced her arrival and cracked a thin smile.

"Flamestrike," the cruiser pronounced, looking up from the grid overlay, "please, sit."

With her bladed tail swinging idly behind her, Flamestrike took up the second seat, her newest appendage easily curling around her ankles, the wings slipping over the chair's back. Without wasting time, she slid forward, peering intently at the overlay. Then as now, a topographical map was displayed, a green grid outlining the sectors and small red dots pointing out the various sensors and/or artillery arrays. Without preamble, Prowl launched into his most detailed plan of attack the femme had heard in her week of meetings. At her side, Windcharger nodded almost absently, twiddling the digits of his right hand beyond the keen gaze of the tactician.

Though she had heard the layout so many times before, Flamestrike once again went it over in her cortex, visualizing the landscape, scenting the pine-soaked air and feeling the needles burrowing into the fine lines in her armor.

"Do calm your tail, Agent."

There was a slight, almost imperceptible _snap_ inside Flamestrike's cortex as she came to; glancing behind her, she saw that her tail was making spasmodic, almost sentient, motions from side to side, displaying her emotions where her facial planes failed to do so. With more force than she thought necessary, Flamestrike willed the appendage to quiet, and it did: falling limp and docile at her feet.

"Well, let's hope she has as many lives as a cat, too," Windcharger commented drolly, sliding the brown and flame-colored femme an amused, but cordial, look. Prowl, however, was of a different opinion.

"The Dinobots, Blaster's cassettes and Solarflare have the liberty of giving themselves over to the instincts of their beastforms, but you do not," he chastised. "If I'd been aware …" Here the cruiser cut himself off, much to the interest of Windcharger; Flamestrike, on the other hand, was mildly embarrassed, reaching behind her to pull the tail up and, lifting her right thigh, sat on the bladed tip to keep it in place. "These instincts have served you well so far," he continued, sitting down and dismissing the hologram, "but you are in control. Use them to your advantage, but do not be ruled by them."

Like a human sparkling, Flamestrike heard herself reply, "Aye, sir," chagrined. Fortunately, for even her small ego, the meeting marched along at a much more professional, and to the point, rate.

As day waxed into dusk, Prowl finally shut things down and dismissed Windcharger; Flamestrike, however, he bade remain. Curious and a little confused, she waved to the Minibot and sat back down. Across from her, she could clearly see the wear and tear on the tactician's grey-plated face. He sat with his hands folded before him on the desk, titanium spine ramrod straight against the back of his steel grey chair – that color a welcome respite from the orange that permeated the facility. Black and white door wings were angled low over his shoulders, much as hers were right now.

"Sir?" she prompted, when all he seemed to do was stare at the now-dead hologram.

The black and white pursed his lips, optics flashing and he gave a slight shake of his head. "This mission," he began, "though small, is no less important. I know you'll do your best to see it to completion."

"Of course," she replied hastily, only to see his optics and mouth give a slight, knowing quirk.

"Good. You leave tomorrow at dawn. Skyfire will be waiting for you and Windcharger on the strip. Good luck." And he rose, extending a slim, powerful hand. Getting to her feet, Flamestrike took it, returning the strong shake with one of her own. Then, with a flick of her tail, she left.

And if she'd had green optics in the back of her head, she would have seen the tactician sit down heavily and pull up the grid, pondering, thinking, and computing.

There was no elevator on the administration level where Prowl resided, so the infiltration femme took the stairs to the gym to take advantage of the one there. On her way past the gym, she heard the beginning strands of a human song drifting out of the open doors intermixed with that of something thudding into a padded object.

"_So wild, standing there, with her hands in her hair …"_

"Holy Primus – this is _not_ workout material!"

"_I can't help but remember, just where she touched me …"_

"Steve Winwood soothes me."

"Yeah, right. I can just picture ol' Buckethead falling down and writhing in agony because you just hit him with a thousand pounds of fluff."

"It's a _workout_, Sunshine." There was a distinct, thoughtful and amusing pause. "I play Chicago when I put my talons through a Seeker."

Flamestrike leaned up against the gym's wide doors, watching the interplay between slight grey femme and hulking golden mech. Sunstreaker was propped up against the far wall, coaching Solarflare through a series of boxing motions; the bag looked as if it'd been through a compactor: hunks of padding were escaping from several long rents in the durrable outer covering. It was a miracle the thing was still taking the beatings it was … probably because Solarflare was sporting a pair of huge red gloves.

Sunstreaker snorted. "You have no taste."

"You have no appreciation for a fine barritone."

"Baby, I _am_ the fine baritone – now pick it up." And to prove his point, the golden Lamborghini walked over to the digital player set in the wall and promptly switched the selection to song that featured heavy bass pounding. Flamestrike suppressed a smile as Flare's crest flattened, but she picked up the pace, albeit a little too enthusiastically. The bag went into a wild swing and hit the Lambo in his polished tush. With Sunstreaker's profane exclaimations ringing in her audios, Flamestrike left the level to the comfort of her room, to prepare herself for the next day – and found herself playing some Golden Age classical music to settle, calm and center her cortex and spark.

* * *

In the pre-dawn hours, a sleek red Pontiac and a brown and flame-colored gryphon left the confines of the fortress that was Autobot City. Small, silent cameras followed their progress as they crossed the bridge, a fine spray from the churning generators covering them from front bumper to rear, from serrated beak to bladed tailtip. Their goal was the huge white Valkyrie who sat idling on the tarmac, turbines whining gently in the cool early summer air.

Despite the relatively lax environment that she had been living in for the past month and a half, the moment her chronometer sounded the hour, Flamestrike once more slipped into the persona war had so carefully crafted for her. Taking her weapons from the rack above her comm unit, she gave them a quick, but thorough check before sliding the pistol into subspace and the tailblade into its recess at the base of her titanium spine. All that she saw before her was her objective: infiltrate the Terrorcon base and set her charges.

On her way to the foyer, she stopped by the armory to pick up two small, lightweight proton bombs which she magna-clamped to her thighs. Two tiny, remote-detonating bombs were slipped into compartments in both wrists. These were her last-ditch suicide bombs; if she was captured and tortured, she could to use them to take not only herself, but anyone within a hundred-yard radius. In all her military career, Flamestrike had heard of infiltration and espionage agents only using them five times. However, if the situation presented itself, she could, with some accuracy, throw them at her captors and hope to Primus that she was fast enough before they detonated. This was a scenario that the femme was painfully acquainted with: once, while trudging through the ruins of a Kaon battle arena, she had come across a small band of Decepticon grunts. Pinned by a lucky spear-throw to the right arm, she ejected both bombs and, with her free hand, threw them at her attackers. Wrenching free, she had transformed and activated them, using the confusion and the bombs' ticking to her advantage for escape.

Windcharger was waiting for her when she came down the steps. Nodding to the two guards who were stationed in the main lobby, Flamestrike transformed and bounded out the doors. Skyfire rumbled a genial greeting and lowered his ramp as she and the Minibot drew near. Someone must have told the huge mech that, while on mission, Flamestrike was not much for conversation, for there was no attempt on the scientist's part to engage her; rather, he and Windcharger traded small-talk on the way to the state of Connecticut. Making the most of the journey, Flamestrike studied a topographical map of the landing site: Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks, CT. From this busy airport, she and Windcharger were to take to the woods … and from there, the Terrorcon hideaway, nestled somewhere in a small park in Simsbury – Stratton Brook.

Flamestrike studied the recent reconn reports with keen interest, knowing that their knowledge would lead her small team to victory … or failure. Only two Terrorcons were known to frequent this area, perhaps taking advantage of the abundant resources to fuel their needs. The reason this sub-faction had so many scattered dens was obvious: Autobot presence was overwhelming. One concentrated den was of no use if an Autobot contingent laid it to the ground; thus, they had these scattered holes all over the continent – and others across Earth. Better to have one small seat of occupation blown up than the major stronghold. Chances were that the Terrorcons in question – Hun-grrr and Sinnertwin, the former the Terrorcon commander and a black-silver dual-headed draconic fiend; the latter a bronzy-orange and blue, also sporting two heads – were not in residence, so a skirmish was unlikely. However, chance played a large role in warfare, so it was prudent to not assume the owners were away on vacation.

Quietly, Skyfire interrupted the femme's deep thoughts with the announcement that he was engaged with the Bradley tower and they were landing. As per the plan, the Valkyrie was cloaked as a 747-Boeing; communication had passed between the humans operating the airport and Autobot City, notifying them of the Autobot presence. A hanger nearest the highway had been reserved for the huge mech and a faux construction site blocked off for easy departure.

Once the rattling of Skyfire's landing had subsided, the huge mech once again lowered his ramp. Together, the two smaller Autobots exited in their altmodes, ignoring the fervent looks airport security tossed them. Leaving Skyfire in their competent care, Flamestrike and Windcharger skirted several idling Delta planes and dashed off behind the construction equipment. A huge chain-link fence separated the tarmac from Windsor Locks highway traffic; a landing American Airlines passenger jet screamed overhead, seeming to touch the top of the fence with outstretched landing gear. The pure force behind the turbines pushed at their bodies, forcing Flamestrike to dig in with all four sets of talons, much to her amazement. Windcharger grumbled about leaving tracks in the dirt along the concrete tarmac, but puttered along until they reached a hole in the fence.

Peering about, Flamestrike was disconcerted. A headwind had delayed them long enough for traffic to accumulate on the roadways. There was no way a bright red sports car and a metal legendary creature could covertly cross.

"Any ideas?" she whispered to Windcharger, sitting on her haunches. The Pontiac flicked his windshield wipers in a moment's thought before replying.

"How much can you carry?"

Ear twitching, Flamestrike cocked her head in the Minibot's direction. "We'd be one big target."

"Depends," the small red and grey mech returned. "I saw the replay of your training runs. I'm not that bad, myself. I'm not stuck this way, you know."

Time was ticking. Making split-second decisions were a part of Flamestrike's job; she'd've been scrap vons ago if it were different. The femme weighed their options but came up short when she realized that Windcharger's suggestion was the only way to go. Backtracking and sluicing through unfamiliar territory was a last resort, and they had not the time. _If this were Cybertron, I wouldn't have to worry about scaring the population_, she thought. _There would be no calls to alert the Decepticons that we were coming_. Swallowing her reservations, Flamestrike conceded the Pontiac's point of view and engaged her anti-grav generators.

It began as a low whine, then slowly, the tremors of the generators were vibrating her whole body. Thrill momentarily replaced the bad sensations of being watched as Flamestrike felt her body rise off the ground. Brilliant sunshine glistened off of her brown and flame-colored structure as she angled herself over Windcharger's waiting form; flaring her pinions, she set all four sets of talons and claws into the Minibot's roof. Her generators gave vent to a shrill, almost Autobot-inaudible whine of protest as they were pushed beyond their usual limits. Gritting her beak, Flamestrike threw more of her reserve into the generators, sensing the increase in power.

**_"Know your limits – but continue to test them."_**

Prowl's passing comment, made after a run on the course, echoed in the vastness of her cortex. The old adage of never knowing until you try – one that was bandied by humans and Cybertronians alike – was never more appropriate than right now.

"Let's go," Windcharger hissed beneath her, ready to get on with the assignment. Flamestrike thought about throwing down an innocuous comment about the Minibot's weight, but now was not the time. With one final thrust, she and Windcharger soared in a graceful arc over six lanes of highway. Their passage was not unnoticed, but few cars had the luxury of stopping to see what UFO was skirting the skies. Those who did pause on the busy roadway were honked into submission and continued on their way, yapping on their cellular phones about what they just witnessed.

Their flight lasted but a few seconds, and all too soon, Flamestrike had to fan her pinions, angling the generators' muzzles to the ground to slow their descent. The distant roar of the airport followed them through the woods for a few miles before fading into the quiet tranquility of undisturbed nature.

It was another two hours' journey – made mostly, by Flamestrike, in gryphonmode; Windcharger had to give up the ease of wheels for his own two feet after a foot into the forest – before they reached the state park. And it was here, at the park's border, that they were to part company. If it were left up to personal choice, Flamestrike would have preferred to have company, however, she was the only one qualified to attempt such an infiltration.

With the map of the park firmly at the fore of her cortex, the sleek gryphonic femme bade farewell to her companion. Windcharger gave her a slight nod and reverted to his Pontiac form, appearing to idle near the trees.

It was well enough for the safety of the two soldiers that Stratton Brook was closed to the public to secure a water main break; too many humans had died in the pursuit of an Autobot mission over the past fifteen years. One less death, one less negative point in the public eye was the key to Autobot victory.

Or so Prowl had wryly commented.

Even from a hundred yards away, Flamestrike could scent the small lake that was purported to house the Terrorcon mini-base. No less aware was Prowl's slight admonishment about keeping her instincts in check; Flamestrike instead relied on her time-honed skills, using these new instincts as a backup – not a confirmation. Firstly, she scanned the immediate area: recreational benches mingled with low, weather-worn sawhorses and a large pile of gravel to one side of her; stacks of piping were sitting innocuously to the other. Cautiously, haunches low to the ground, Flamestrike began her crawl into enemy territory. Paw over paw she moved, all scanners on full. As she crept to the left, part of her began to wonder why the enemy would stake a claim on such a human-filled area. Almost immediately on that query's tail came the answer: hostages. If there was one thing the Decepticons could hold over the Autobots, it was the promise of human blood being spilled.

Having seen the slaughter of her people – runners, intellectuals and non-combatants – Flamestrike felt a low growl start in the bowels of her chest and ripple up her sleek brown-plated throat at the senseless slaughter of more innocents, of people, like her own group, who could not claim weapons to defend themselves.

Through this miasma of potential hazards and ambush hideouts, the gryphon femme stalked. Sensors on high, she padded up to the first obstacle, every servo on edge, ready to transform. Slipping her head over the leading pipe's rounded end, her optics found nothing. From this angle, she could clearly see behind the sawhorses and the gravel pile: also secure. Satisfied, but no less alert, the gryphon femme padded on.

Loose bits of gravel dug into the sensitive cracks in her foretalons and rear paws; most she ignored, but there was a time or two that forced her to stop, sit on her haunches, and curl like a cat to worry a particularly irksome piece free. Then, stalwart, she'd rise and continue, scanning, looking, pinions and tail twitching in an unconscious mimic of her old spoiler.

The small lake spread before her, covered with fowl feathers, bits of water-logged bread and the occasional lump of grass clippings. This was the most difficult part of her job – the base was underwater, and being avian-feline, she was at a disadvantage. Approaching the waterline at an angle, Flamestrike transformed, falling back on her hindlegs as her body parts flew around her in an almost-soundless motion. Pistol drawn from subspace, she glanced around, making doubly sure of her lone status in the park. The proton bombs on her hips clattered, shifting. Stepping to the lake's edge, Flamestrike peered into the blue-brown water, optical sensors whirling, compensating for the difficult visibility. She couldn't quite pierce the depths, but it was enough to assure her that no Terrorcon lurked inches below. Before she entered, the femme manually closed off all open ports, including the line to her ventilators. This was the most dangerous thing for her to do: if she got overheated, she had no way to cool her system off, being underwater.

Pistol at the ready, she slipped into the lukewarm waters, the last thing anyone aboveground seeing was the tri-pronged, flame-colored tail – and then it, too, submerged.


	6. The Dance

Chapter Six

Through the depths, a pair of green optics glowed, illuminating the silvery scales of the two fish that swam past her. The actual lake wasn't that deep and Flamestrike found herself touching the sandy bottom in a few nanoclicks. Tail floating freely behind her, she moved forward, focusing on the large metal doors that were attached to a short chute not five feet from where she landed. Wider than she was tall (more than double that slim height) the doors appeared to be made of reinforced steel, painted that ubiquitous Decepticon purple; floating closer, Flamestrike found a large key pad sitting in the upper right. No lights blinked, which was not surprising – on a clear day, they would've been easily visible. Drawing near, Flamestrike pulled a thin disruptor charge from another compartment in her right forearm. The device, when applied to the access panel, emitted a short yellow spark and a slight pop. Immediately, the doors groaned, sliding apart only a few inches before coming to a stop. No less aware for her success, Flamestrike pulled a pipe-like instrument from her right thigh and set it between the gap in the doors. Pulling at her lower lip reflectively, she activated the bar and moved to the side.

The tiny instrument suddenly sprouted three-pronged "hands" from either end; these claws latched onto the edges, taking a firm grip before the tube began to expand. The doors whimpered and moaned, crying out against the unfairness they to which they were being subjected. Optics flickering about her now and then, Flamestrike stood on the lake bottom, arms crossed, tail twitching behind her, watching the mechanical crowbar do its job.

A moment, then two, was all the brown and flame-colored femme could afford, lest the occupants come home early – or come flying through the doors. Once the bar had pushed the entranceway wide enough so she could squeeze between the gap, Flamestrike deactivated it, stuffing it away. Then, with a tug on her tail to get it through, she was in the chamber.

Water filled the tunnel, illuminated by a strip of lights along the "floor". Carefully, Flamestrike advanced, adopting a froggish swimming technique, which she augmented with a few easy flicks of her tri-bladed tail after some experimentation. Thus, croc-like, she delved deeper under the lakebed, gritting her dental plates in a vain effort to keep her system as cool as possible. The chill of the water that surrounded her helped ease the strain on her servos, but it could not reach the delicate circuitry that powered her biomechanical body.

Not that she wanted it to.

One hundred feet in (not that great a length to a femme of her size), the tunnel abruptly straightened. The steady line of track lighting split into two, one to either side of the infiltration specialist. _And so, we begin_, she mused, reaching up and out with both arms in an effort to lift herself from the chilly depths. Getting in was the easiest part of her job; getting out, intact, with your objective complete – this was the hardest. Keeping the first half of her long tail stiff, Flamestrike gave a powerful sweep of the flame-colored blade, shooting along the slight incline and onto the base floor.

Immediately, Flamestrike opened all ventilation points on her body, the feeling of lightheadedness taking a brief hold on her cortex before her system regulated itself. She took a deep breath for good measure, almost hearing her system sigh in relief. The band of pressure along her brow eased, and she stepped forward, taking in her new environment with a sweep of her crested head.

Her tail detached from her spinal column with a faint _snick_; transferred to her hand, it was no longer an ornament, or a swimming aid. Bladed and equipped with three flame jets, the femme could use this staff to ward off initial strikes before resorting to her pistol. Primus would know if all her hours training with pugel sticks would pay off.

Long associated with Decepticon equipment, Flamestrike made for the central computer. To either side of her were long tables, each with its own miniature laboratory. Beakers and tubes bubbled over blue flames; the acrid tang of burning chemicals washed all the memory of the water's cold fetidness from Flamestrike's olfactory sensors and she gave an involuntary sneeze to clear them. That she happened to be standing next to a rather large set-up with an undefined greyish metal was completely up to chance. "Slag," she hissed as her hip-plate knocked the beaker over. Quickly, she brushed the residue off of her right thigh, flicking her digits over the table before moving towards the main computer bank.

Set-up was a matter of placing the proton bombs on either side of the computer. With a thin strip of wire, Flamestrike tied them together, inserting either end into a slim timer box. With a flick of thumb over switch, Flamestrike set the charge to five minutes; dropping the box, she allowed her body's magnetism to rejoin tail to spine before making a head-long charge to the tunnel's entrance.

The unholy roar that filled the tunnel, strong despite the water's muffling capability, reached her audios before the first of two silver serpentine heads broke the film. Without stopping to think, Flamestrike set claws to floor, praising Primus for the unevenness of the tiling that gave her a good grip. She spun on one foot and headed back towards the lab, picking up any vial that came to hand and throwing it at the nearest head.

Alternating throwing and firing shots from her pistol, Flamestrike drew the Terrorcon Hun-grrr from the exit. The stench of burning chemicals – many of which were never supposed to come into contact with each other – gave birth to a miasma that permeated every corner of the underwater lair. The seconds were ticking away inside her cortex, making every moment she stayed in the base one closer to her final day on earth.

"Autobot infiltrator!" Hun-grrr rumbled from dual throats, his words more of a growl-and-chew than actual language.

_Gotta move, gotta move_, she chanted, spinning around to grab a huge beaker. This time, she did not heave it at one of Hun-grrr's twin heads; rather, she heaved it in the vicinity. The huge dual-serpent followed the trajectory, optic ridges widening as the burning chemicals ignited a trail of powder left by one of her earlier attacks.

It was all Flamestrike needed. Gathering what strength she had left, she sprinted forward, rolling under the huge creature's plated belly. Roaring, his olfactory and optical sensors no doubt positively burning from her assault, Hun-grrr lashed out with his thick tail, dragging a huge chunk of the wall above the femme's ducking head down to the ground.

_3:34 – 3:33 …_

Diving into the depths, Flamestrike transformed, ignoring the pain that resulted from compressing water into delicate circuitry. Without a second's thought, she activated her anti-grav boosters, streaking along the tunnel's floor, her whipping tail digging up lights as she moved.

_3:00 – 2:59 …_

Hun-grrr's roar sent shockwaves through the water, flowing out of the tunnel and into the lake proper. _2:30 – 2:29_

With all the grace of a dead dolphin, Flamestrike turned on her side, easily sliding through the huge perforation in the tunnel doors – no doubt ripped apart by the Terrorcon in his rage of discovery. Energon pump going twice as fast as it normally would, the femme angled herself towards the surface, breaking the film of dander, bread and grass with a mild explosion.

_1:30 – 1:29 …_

Water cascaded from her arcing body, streaming off of pinions, haunches and tail in a thousand tiny rivers. Flamestrike reached deep, calling up all the hidden reserves her body sculptors had seen fit to equip within her. A deep vibration began within her chest, spreading quickly to each pinion until her whole body was one huge metal ball of disharmony.

_3 … 2 … 1 …_

A column of water, nearly the width and breadth of the lake, erupted underneath the fleeing femme. The force of the blast threw up thousands of gallons of water, silt and fish particles; more than one fin or tail of an unlucky lake-dweller found itself flopping onto Flamestrike's armor, before rolling off with the next cascade.

_"FLAMESTRIKE!"_

Dear Primus, she'd forgotten Windcharger! Homing in on the Minibot's comm-signal, Flamestrike plowed through the second upheaval as water desperately tried to get back to its source. As she passed over what remained of the lake, she could not see if there were Decepticon bits floating among the general destruction.

_"FLAMESTRIKE!"_ While Windcharger's shout was more of an order, Flamestrike detected a hint of hysterics and remembered to reply.

_"Mission complete. Let's go!"_

All she received in acknowledgement was a slight "grunt" on the airwaves. Spinning on her inner pinion, Flamestrike angled her battered body towards the park's entrance. The mission's high carried her as far as Skyfire's welcoming bay, and then, flopped on a low bunk within the huge Autobot scientist, Flamestrike gave herself over to exhaustion, vaguely aware that her right side was beginning to itch.

* * *

"Thallium poisoning?" Ratchet nearly bellowed incredulously. "There's nothing in you to react to thallium!"

Flamestrike lay on her side in the medbay, hands wrapped around a Kevlar-wrapped pillow as another ripple overtook her right side. Through clenched teeth, she carefully debunked the CMO's theory: "I … am _allergic_," she pronounced. "The cores of my support system were mined on Helix-3, an asteroid that was completely stripped of its metals early in the second Golden Age." Pain overtook the agent; indeed, there was a slight greenish tinge to her brown exostructure – evidence of her words, as it was not algae. "My creator, Twilight, bought a large of trilithium from the mine's dealer, unaware of its alien taint. It wasn't until vons later that we found out that the asteroid's trilithium reacts badly when thallium is brought near." Memory of that time, of an agony so acute that she wanted to shutdown brutally sprang to the front of Flamestrike's cortex. Passing a hand over her face, the femme looked up to see the white mech gazing at her. Ratchet's mouth quirked in sympathy before his usual stern mien took over.

"Obviously, there is a cure," Ratchet said, folding his arms over his boxy chest, glancing to the far end of the bay where several Paradron medics were analyzing the effects of pure thallium on a sample of Flamestrike's inner support.

Another ripple brought a low moan from the depths of Flamestrike's vocalizer. Squeezing her optic shutters tight, the femme writhed in misery, fingers scrabbling at her armor, seeking to alleviate the itching. "A – aloe."

"Aloe? Where on Cybertron did you get _aloe_?"

Trembling, a fine sheen of coolant coating her lips, Flamestrike murmured, "Mother Beta – Twilight's creator – she had a small arboretum." Back then, when Flamestrike had gone by another name she had long since disregarded as part of an idyllic past, she had writhed in constant pain while Twilight scrambled the best scientists she could find. In the end, Flamestrike had had to enter stasis-lock to keep her cortex from overloading. How they found that spraying a mixture of aloe with a diluted lubricant counteracted the effects, she would never know – but she carried the formula with her ever since. In subspace and in her head.

With the world ringing in her audios, Flamestrike never heard Ratchet's slight sucked-in breath as she related her lineage. "Do you know how to make this cure?"

Without a word, Flamestrike lifted an aching right arm and, grimacing, opened her subspace port. Handing Ratchet the disc containing the formula, she collapsed, spent on the examination table.

"Put her under," the CMO ordered First Aid, reaching forward and closing the femme's optic shutters completely. With a sigh that lifted his huge box of a chest, Ratchet turned towards Prowl. The former second-in-command had been lounging, inconspicuous, in the corner ever since Flamestrike's symptoms had prevented her from reporting to him immediately after a cursory check-up. If Ratchet didn't know any better, the black and white cruiser's posture mimicked a mech from fifteen years ago. At least, in Prowl's case, he didn't feel obligated to hover like Mirage had. Regardless, the ambulance had more important things on his mind than to weigh the similarities. "Give me a couple clicks and she should be ready to report," he told Prowl, turning his back and running his hands under a thin stream of water. "How'd it go, anyway?"

"A complete success," the cruiser replied. "Though, we won't know the full extent until the scouts come back. Initial searches revealed a trail of Energon, oil and coolant, along with a mess of Terrorcon-sized footprints. I'm having the images analyzed as we speak."

Ratchet grunted. "So, this girl gets to keep her perfect kill record."

"No, it's her infiltration record that is perfect," Prowl corrected. "Her kill ratio is seventy-percent when engaged."

Another non-committal grunt from the CMO. "You can have her once we've gotten rid of the 'rash'."

Prowl merely nodded. He glanced at where Flamestrike lay prone on the table, turned and left.

-----------------

While Ratchet dismissed the appellation of "miracle worker" with a curt rejoinder and a nod, Flamestrike knew that he was puffing up inside. Her joints and inner support infused with the cure, the infiltration specialist spent the rest of the day in the CMO's tender care before being released with a clean bill of health. Following a brief respite in her room, she trudged up to Prowl's office to give her report.

To her chagrin, she had not succeeded in killing Hun-grrr, though, she had left him with extensive damage. Scouts had been sent to locate the Terrorcon, but he had vanished into the depths of some new lair, trailing oil, Energon and other precious fluids for several miles before staunching the flows – or finding allies. Since the Terrocon's demise was not a priority, the search had been called off after three days, and the Autobots returned to the City in order to prepare for the next wave of missions.

For Flamestrike, her work had barely begun. No doubt impressed by her skills (though he never admitted it aloud with those words), Prowl started sending her on one mission after the other – sometimes with barely a week between for recuperation. A running joke among the femme's fellow agents was to try and guess the "mission of the week": a midnight flight to the Andes, a twenty mile trek through the Amazon rainforest, some unnamed salt mine, an abandoned coal mine in Pennsylvania … Her successes earned her the nickname "Prowl's Iron Fist" due to the mech's ability to point out a target and for Flamestrike to subsequently destroy it. Of course, given Flamestrike's dislike for nicknames, she should have glared any offenders into submission … but she didn't. To her surprise, she liked it. And while Solarflare offered to go to Prowl on her friend's behalf, to tell the cruiser to lighten up, Flamestrike told her it was unnecessary. When Optimus Prime himself tried to elevate her to the rank of officer, she refused.

"An officer stays behind," she respectfully told the huge Autobot commander. "I'd rather remain a lowly soldier and do what I came here to do." Of course, as soon as the words were out of her mouth, she colored. Prime was an officer who never let others do his work for him.

"Just keep returning to us in one piece, Agent," he replied, a quirk of his brow ridges letting her know that he found no disrespect in her candidness.

Sooner or later, the Decepticons found out who was blowing up their bases and Flamestrike's work suddenly became more deadly. After an ambush that nearly blew her wings off, Prowl saw the merit of easing off of his best agent. Broken and bleeding her life's fluids all over the snow, she had managed to set the bomb and was dragged away by a small contingent of Autobots before an explosion rocked the glacier. After that, Prowl took her off of active infiltration, instead indicating that she should help train the other agents.

At first, being out of action was irritating after so many moons of near-constant activity and it grated on the femme's nerves. Her growing friendship with Solarflare calmed her and she soon found that being the trainer could be just as rewarding as actually being on the mission. That she spent much of this time with Prowl … well, she soon found out what a bonus being locked in a strategy room with the tactician could be.

* * *

Flamestrike looked up at a knock on the door. She had been eagerly anticipating the return to her room after Prowl's debriefing, to her self-admitted "reward" for a successful mission. Ever since being reformatted into her new gryphonic alt-mode; she developed an appreciation for the creatures, even if they were mythical. (This form, of course, had saved her spark too many times to count.) Quickly double-checking her order information for one sculpted gryphon statue, she stabbed the "print" button while simultaneously rising from her seat to answer the door.

Wings cocked at a jaunty angle, Solarflare greeted her fellow avian-femme with a grin. "Flame!" A _nickname_? Yes, somehow Solarflare had managed to get Flamestrike to accept the shortened form when Flare complained that her full name took too long to say in times of peril. "The Twins managed to cook up another batch of their special brew without Red catching on. Blaster's got some new tunes he wants to share. Just about everyone's eager to relax for a bit. C'mon." Before Flamestrike could blink, the grey femme had latched on to her arm, pulling the startled agent from her room. "_You_ are going to come out and join the party!"

Casting one last wistful glance behind her, Flame deferred to her friend's enthusiasm and both femmes traipsed down the hallway to the front gates of Autobot City. She hadn't attended any parties since the gaffe on the night of her arrival. Training, acclimating to the new terrain, and Prowl's briefings had taken up all her time. Of course, her naturally solitary nature didn't help matters much either. Flamestrike could survive in a crowd, but preferred the company of one or two friends at a time. Unable to completely mask her apprehension, Flamestrike's tail twitched from side to side, much to the amusement of Solarflare. Stealing a glance out of the corner of her optic range, Flame noticed that Flare's crest feathers were flicking in conscious mimicry of the bladed tail's writhing. Solarflare caught Flamestrike's optics and amber gaze met green. One last twitch, in unison. _That_ set off both femmes' sense of the ridiculous and both started laughing, mock-swiping at each other.

"Okay, okay, I get it. I've been a real downer lately, haven't I?" admitted Flamestrike, wiping leakage from the corners of her optics, still chuckling.

"You have been working pretty hard. And I know you wanted the last mission to be a success," Flare shot the infiltration agent a sly glance, "so you could give some good news to your esteemed mission-planner."

Metal clanged as Flamestrike swatted Flare backside with the flat of her bladed tail-tip, the sound attracting momentary attention from two lone soldiers tramping through the foyer. Clamping down her control on the offending appendage, she composed her facial planes into a pleasant expression and replied mildly, "Well, I couldn't allow my perfect record to be compromised, no matter what – even if my trainees are involved." Cocking her head to the side, Flamestrike grinned. Solarflare met the expression with a slightly-lowered brow ridge and a soft smile. Flamestrike could tell her response wasn't fooling the comm officer one bit. She _knew_.

_How can she know? _Flame mentally countered. _I barely acknowledge it myself. I just want Prowl to notice me. There's more to him than he lets on. He's been the tactician for so long … he's forgotten how to be a regular citizen … _The long days and nights in the meeting room, in his office … what had begun as a healthy respect was slowly turning into something more. While she found herself loosening up, she could see no change in Prowl. Most jokes were met with a slight quirk of the mouth, nothing more; the Twins' pranks impressed him even less. What he _did_ seem to be impressed by were her skills. Once, she had almost heard him admit how alike they were – committed to the cause, dedicated and given to respect.

_Almost_.

Flamestrike, however, had no reservations about commenting on their similarties. Prowl merely nodded, gave her a small smile. "I suppose that is why I have no problem with you," he once said. "You are one of the most competent soldiers I've ever worked with."

Then as now, Flamestrike felt the metal of her cheeks heat. A friendly, taloned hand clasped her shoulder joint briefly. Matching gazes again Flamestrike knew that Flare would never betray her knowledge.

Both femmes reached the entrance to Autobot City and the retractable ramp to the ground outside. "Where is this event taking place, anyway?" asked Flamestrike as she peered around the grounds without spotting revelers.

"Since Red has a major fit any time we let loose, the Twins managed to secure a nice little spot by the lake North of Lookout Mountain. We're still close to the City but far enough away from humans that our activities aren't usually noticed." Solarflare's eagle head snapped up to regard Flamestrike as the grey femme transformed. Firing her boosters, she took to the air with a cry of unrestrained joy, circling back for her friend.

Flamestrike smiled. Then she, too, transformed. Her beak and head panels formed up around her crest, her arms folded into her chest while shoulder panels opened, releasing her taloned forelimbs. Her wings unfurled, red primaries extending to their full length as her lower legs simultaneously folded back and down, exchanging petite "boots" for lion's paws. Her bladed tail-tip snapped open, lashing back and forth in the ecstasy of _feeling_. Cranking her anti-grav units, she timed a prodigious leap with the firing of her own boosters to launch her gryphon-form into the sky.

It was too short a flight before both winged forms spiraled down, transforming, to land in a lakeshore clearing framed on one side by the rocky mountain. Music blasted while groups of mixed Autobots intermingled, enjoying the darkening evening through chatting, dancing, and (of course!) imbibing in the various libations scattered about in conveniently located containers.

Solarflare had barely touched down before she was embraced by her bondmate Mirage. Stifling a pang of unidentified emotion, Flamestrike waited patiently, taking a moment to scan her new surroundings. In her immediate view she could see Jazz and Blaster, already cranking their tunes and generally enjoying themselves to one side of the packed down "dance floor." The music was heavily rhythmic and loud enough to be heard over the stomping gyrations of several Autobot mechs and femmes who looked to be quite enjoying themselves. Glimpses of her trainer Sunstreaker as he showed himself off to various admirers made Flamstrike smile again. Sweeping her gaze, she was unable to identify all the attendees, but ran a roster of those she knew through her head.

_Sideswipe, of course. Brawn. Ironhide. There's Bluestreak, talking to Cliffjumper… _

She backed up a few paces to the base of the cliff and leaned against it, quite content to watch the action from a distance.

"Well, Primus, Prowl's Iron Fist out and about? How's about joining me for a dance or two?"

Flamestrike looked up to see a soldier she never thought she'd ever lay optics on again: Turnout. The same lascivious mech who had made more than one rude comment during their early days in the City. While he wasn't exactly leering, his posture spoke of not-good intentions. "Not right now," she said, hoping he would take the dismissal and leave. But no; her reproach only caused the white and teal mech to double his efforts. Across the impromptu dance floor, Flame caught sight of Solarflare's crested head peeking up and around the mass of bodies, no doubt looking for where her friend had wandered. While Flamestrike's optics weren't as sharp as the comm officer's, she saw Solarflare's brow ridges raise and she pointed Mirage towards the escalation.

"C'mon," Turnout wheedled. "One dance. Don't be such a stiff. I promise I'll hold you lightly, seeing as you like to break."

Suddenly, the top of Flame's head felt hot; she saw Turnout's optics bulge as tiny flamelets started to shoot out of the red-orange-yellow crest along the top of her head as her anger intensified. "I said 'no'. Go away."

A slim black hand clamped tightly over Turnout's shoulder. Half-turning, the engineer saw the tall, lithe form of Mirage rising behind him, Solarflare mantling nearby. "The lady does not require your presence any longer," the Tower-born mech said softly, at his most urbane. Inwardly, Flame sighed; it wasn't as if she couldn't handle herself. But, mechs will be mechs, no matter how many bases you blew up.

Clearly, Turnout had no idea to whom he was speaking, for he brazenly batted the spy's hand away. "You got your own femme. There aren't that many to go around."

Mirage frowned, looking down his nose at the white-turquoise mech and transforming himself into the haughty personage he had long left behind. It was such a smooth transformation that Flamestrike was momentarily taken aback by its suddenness. "I told you to leave her alone. I'm giving you one chance to remove your festering bulk from my presence before my olfactory sensors die of the stench."

Flamestrike saw the mech's servos twitch as he brought his arm back to slug Mirage in his light blue face; she jumped forward to restrain Turnout, but the spy was quicker. He sidestepped Turnout's swing and, reaching up, grabbed the offending arm, twisting it behind the engineer's back with an audible _snap_ of servos. "I really do not like party crashers," the spy drolled, wrenching Turnout's dislocated arm higher over his head. "And fighting. That, too." With a final twist, Mirage shoved Turnout into the arms of two off-duty protectorates, who, by their clenched dental plates, were not happy at having to leave the party to deal with him.

The gryphonic femme watched them haul Turnout away before turning back to Mirage. "You didn't have to –"

Snobby elitist gave way to the mien she was used to. Mirage smiled ruefully and shook his head. "I don't fight Flare's battles, but I figured that he would make your life a living hell one way or another if you beat him up yourself."

The possibility of retaliation from some nameless friends had not occurred to the brown and flame-colored femme. Realizing that, despite her misgivings, Mirage was correct in his assessment, Flame nodded. "Thank you."

The spy gave her a wink and walked away, only to be swallowed up by the crowd without seeming to try. By her side, Flare crossed her arms, watching him leave with a gleam of pride in her golden optics. "Do you want to dance?"

"Mm." Flamestrike considered, realizing that the celebration was for her, in part. She couldn't keep standing on the sidelines if she was going to try to have a life outside of infiltration. "Sure!" Solarflare grinned, white dental plates against charcoal lips, and was off and running, the gryphonic femme on her huge heels.

* * *

Hound's affable ribbing had brought Prowl down here tonight. He stood on the sidelines, a cool mug of oil in one hand, listening to Beachcomber and the tracker chatter about various odds and ends. He might have warmed to the event had the two off-duty protectorates not brought him the disgraced Turnout. A simple locking of optics told the engineer that his time on Earth was terminated and he was going to be sent back to the battle zone that was Cybertron on the next available shuttle. Prowl was _not_ going to have his greatest asset abused!

"Well, would you look at that," the geologist mused appraisingly when Prowl turned back around. "Seems Flare's gotten your agent to lighten up at last."

Prowl turned, his far-seeing optics catching a glimpse of flame-colored crest and a snatch of grey, black-tipped wings rising and falling above the general height of the crowd. Logic failing him, he asked, "What are they doing?"

Hound chuckled deep in his huge, boxy chest. "Seems Sunny got a hold of that anti-grav generator the humans have been experimenting with. Looks to me like the girls are floating above it."

"Well, that's the end of …"

Beachcomber reached over and gave the cruiser a friendly slug in his shoulder plate. "Let it slide, man. Your chick took out ten strongholds. Let her have fun."

Prowl glanced at the blue and white dune buggy before consigning himself to silence. Hound and Beachcomber took the silence for resignation and moved closer to the action, no doubt to cheer the two femmes on with good-natured hoots. Setting his mug aside, Prowl leaned up against one of the tables, one arm folded across his chest, the other rubbing his chin; thoughtfully, the cruiser turned his gaze, searching the crowd. There was Mirage, feet propped up on a crate, a glass of high grade in one hand, bemusement etched into his facial planes; next to him, Hound squatted, making motions with both hands in relation to the action before them. Between anecdotes, the tracker was eagerly watching the two femmes, the look on his face unmistakable.

With a blink of blue optics, the cruiser terminated that line of thought. He had better things to do than to ruminate on the potentialities between his comrades. Despite this, he continued to watch. Flamestrike was one of the best soldiers he'd seen many a von; she was dedicated and completely straightforward with her logic. Her kill record and infiltration scores had more than impressed him, which was why he had requested that she be put under his command in the first place. After she continued her unbroken line of completed missions, Ultra Magnus had stopped by and complemented him on acquiring such a competent agent.

A small, secret smile graced the graven facial planes of the tactician. Across the floor, Flamestrike caught his optic … and smiled back.

-----------------

**A/N: Part of this chapter was co-written by Anne "Tyrrlin" B., who owns Flamestrike.**


	7. The Shooting

Chapter Seven

Had she really seen what she _thought_ she'd seen? Hardly. Or so she was trying to convince herself. Prowl made little mention of the evening soirée, except to comment on Turnout and let her know that he had found himself on a fast shuttle back to the grit and grime that was their homeworld. And so, life moved onwards: battles, skirmishes and the occasional ground being lost to Megatron's space armada.

Despite her refusal to take an officer's rank, Flamestrike found herself in Prowl's office planning, calculating and overseeing the execution of smaller raids more often than actually being out in the field. Which was why, in the beginning, almost as if he knew that he needed to placate his agent, Prowl did send her out on a mission or two.

With Energon singing in her silicone veins, Flamestrike found the occasional outing was all she needed to be comfortable with her advisor role. _Actually, being with Prowl has a lot to do with it, _she thought, leaning over the strategy board, idly thumbing the Decepticon markers around a mock-up of Martha's Vineyard one day. Prowl had had to take a break to deal with one of the Twins' latest excursions, leaving her to play with the pieces until he returned. It was such a normal occurrence that Flame had long since given up being impatient; anticipating an interruption, she'd taken to bringing a reader with her, tucked safe away in subspace.

She could hear him now; his voice never raised, but his annoyance clear as he berated the red Twin – Sideswipe. _He never seems to smile_, she mused, shuffling two small Autobot sigils around the lighthouse. _Sometimes, if I'm lucky, he will, but it's so rare_. How was it that she, who had been a near-image of the tactician, could have loosened up after such a short time on Earth? And he had been here almost twenty human years! _Well, part of it must have to do with him being second-in-command for the Energon mission. There's no telling what kind of strain that must've been. Still_. Cocking her head, Flamestrike caught Sideswipe's plaintive wheedle and Prowl's curt rejoinder, effectively cutting off the Lamborghini's explanation. Curling her tail over her right thigh, Flamestrike peered at her disorganization with a critical optic. _You know, that just might work …_

"If we bring in a scout from the right, twenty meters in, anyone at this window won't see him coming," Prowl said, slipping up behind her in a move that caused Flame to shoot a tiny sparklet from her crest in surprise. "Otherwise, this is an interesting set-up. Now, what about the three reinforcements in the dunes?"

A delicate chime, rising in perfect harmony, sounded. Prowl lifted his upper half from where it was hovering over Flame's shoulder. "Yes?"

"_It's just me, Prowl,"_ Solarflare's voice lit over the comm.

Glancing up, Flame watched the tactician's brow ridge quirk – be it in humor or resignation, she couldn't be certain. "Do you have those intelligence reports?" he asked.

"_Open the door, Prowl. I don't like talking to walls."_

To Flamestrike's amazement, a deep grunt of amusement echoed within the cruiser's chest. "You associate with them often enough," he returned, activating the door via a wrist-link. Solarflare appeared, stepping through as the pneumatic door hissed shut at her pinion-tips. With a glance behind her to make sure all feathers were accounted for, Flare leveled a glare at the cruiser, folding her arms over her chest. For a moment, she looked as if she were going to give voice to a biting retort, but there was a slight swallowing motion, and she said instead, "No, I don't have the reports yet. Blaster's team is in the final stages of decoding Shockwave's transmission. You should have it within the hour."

Seemingly satisfied, Prowl nodded. "Then what brings you here?"

Flare grinned, her crest rising over her nasal ridge. "I came to drag Flamestrike away, if that's okay with you."

With a shake of his head, Prowl nodded. "Go ahead. My concentration's broken. Flamestrike," he continued, turning to address her directly, "reconvene tomorrow?"

"Of course," Flame told him, watching as he reached over her right arm where it lay on the table to shut down the projection, leaving just the markers on a green grid.

Walking over to the strategy table and appropriating a stool upon which she perched, Flare flipped over a leaflet that she had been holding in one hand. "I received a transmission this afternoon from _Maxim_ magazine – that's a human male-oriented publication. They want to do a special femme edition – for charity," she tacked on hastily, perceptive of Prowl's interest in their conversation.

"Really," Prowl grunted, glancing over the printed page. "The last time we did something as a group for charity, Megatron froze us in altmode. And don't forget the ambush at the Boys and Girls Club convention in 1995 …"

"As far as I know, this is not something that they've even highly publicized. I ran a quick check over the 'Net to be sure. And," the grey femme added, "it would be bad press if they did so before even asking us."

"You would know that better than I," Prowl replied, looking at the flyer before walking around to the other side of the table, picking up markers and putting them away.

Ignoring the cryptic-sounding response from the tactician, Flamestrike reached down and scooped up the leaflet, her optics flying over the tiny human lettering. The offer seemed honest enough, but the poses included on the transmission's header and footer were fairly troublesome.

"What kind of publication is this?"

To her surprise, Flare colored slightly, her cheek plates lighting up a pale rose against the white. "Like I said, it's a male-oriented magazine." When Flamestrike continued to stare, her optic ridges begging for an explanation, Flare sighed. "You've seen the movies the Twins watch, right?"

Flame sat back, images flickering through her cortex before she came up with the scene Flare was referring to. Near-naked human females, perspiration and what seemed to be odd poses. "Y-es … Do _you_ want to do this?"

Solarflare shrugged. "I think it would be fun. I have Optimus' approval to contact the company if anyone wants to do it."

"Solarflare …" Prowl took up the missive, the plain paper painfully small in his larger white metallic hand.

"Don't." Flare held up one taloned index finger, her golden optics narrowing slightly. "I got the third degree from Red, Prowl. He reamed me a good one for trying to compromise City security if we do small biographies. _Bios_, mind you, not crotch-bearing pin-ups." She huffed, struts sagging. "That came from Optimus. But, he thought it over and said we could do it if enough femmes wanted to. So far, I've gotten five."

Leaning back on her stool, tailtip flicking against her calf, Flamestrike regarded her friend. There were times when the gossip she'd heard from the other femmes made perfect sense, and this was one of them. Flame was fairly certain that if it had been herself presenting the information, Prime would have taken a page from Red Alert's book and shut it down. However, she hardly knew Solarflare to be of the persuasive nature, wheedling in order to get her way. Of course, who was she to judge her friend, when those same femmes were tittering on and on about her "relationship" with Prowl?

"What makes this company think that human males will want to see the Cybertronian idea of 'femininity'?"

"I suspect," came an opinion from an unexpected corner as Prowl returned the paper to Solarflare, "that they will simply be curious. For this reason, and hopefully _only_ for this reason, is why I keep finding Sunstreaker and Sideswipe with copies of _Playboy_ and _Hustler_." There was a pause, and he looked directly at Flare. "This does not mean I approve."

With more audacity than Flamestrike could ever hope to claim, Flare reached out and gently flicked Prowl on a doorwing. "I didn't expect you to. Just don't let me catch you on the set if this goes through."

"Perish the thought," Prowl replied with a ghost of a smile before he left them for the sanctity of his inner office.

_Is there … something … I don't know about?_ Flamestrike wondered as she and Flare rose to leave. She was hardly as eagle-optic'd as either of the Ark warriors, but – well, maybe she was reading into things too much. That, and she was running low on fuel. Lost in her thoughts, she barely registered walking through the hall, or where they were going until Flare touched her on the shoulder plate.

"Are you okay? Did your session go well?"

Despite their friendship, Flamestrike was anything if not direct. She hated beating around the bush. "Prowl seems to smile more when you're around. Did you two …?" Would this ruin their friendship if her assumptions – indeed, some worm of jealousy – were correct? Regardless, that she even was asking the question told volumes about her personal development over the past few months.

Flare halted, crest ringing against her helm. However, the words she spoke were not ones of guilty admission. "Years ago, Prowl had this problem with 'fangirls' … he still does, if you've seen the mail he gets. Anyway, he asked me to help find a way to get them off of his back, so I started walking around with him in public, hoping my presence would deter hormonal females. It kind of backfired. I didn't know until Mirage told me years later, but it seemed Prowl was becoming interested in me." A heavy sigh lifted the femme's chestplate. "Don't worry, Flame. We've long since gotten over that – all of us. He might not acknowledge it, but I count Prowl as one of my 'brothers'. Like I told you before, he's all yours – if you can get him. And believe me, femmes have tried." She paused, looking at her taloned hands. "And if he smiles more, well, I do things like that. I'm painfully naïve sometimes." She chuckled softly, pinions fanning out behind her.

Flamestrike took in her friend's words, leaning up against the wall. Everything was a jumble and that made her uneasy. She liked her world nice and orderly, and she said as much to the grey comm officer. "Ah, but that's where you have an advantage over the others," Flare told her, a true smile erasing the last moment's embarrassment.

Her own shorter crest quirking, Flame eased up along the wall. Earlier, she might have caught onto Flare's line of thought, but current events seemed to have robbed her of that particular talent. "What do you mean?"

"I told you, you're alike in many ways. But you know how to have fun and aren't afraid to get a little loose. That's all Prowl needs. I'm sure he recognizes the sameness – which is probably why he keeps you so close at hand. Not that you're a half-baked infiltrationist, mind!" Solarflare added with a wicked chuckle. "C'mon … are you going to do this with me or not? Otherwise, I'll have to suffer Arcee all alone."

If leering human males were anything compared to leering mechs, Flamestrike was well within her rights to worry. "Do I have to pose like … this?" she asked, taking the paper from Flare's hand and gesturing to one female who was spread so far open at the crotch, she might pop.

"I figure they'll have to accept whatever we're comfortable with … otherwise, who's going to argue with a bunch of fifteen-foot tall female 'robots'?"

"Okay, you got me." Looping an arm around the smaller femme's struts, they walked to the rec room for a glass of Energon to celebrate.

* * *

In total, ten femmes of Autobot City found _Maxim_'s proposal interesting enough to sign up. To save Red Alert another trip to Ratchet's office to have his cortex defragged, the small battalion of photographers, make-up artists, light specialists and other hangers' on were directed to set up near the training field. Initially, the make-up artists were confounded – they were well-versed in creating illusions on the faces and bodies of human females, but Autobot "skin" was not human flesh. One of the femmes, a sun-colored comm specialist aptly-named Vision, who worked below Blaster and Solarflare's tower, saved them from a potential coronary by supplying the team with various waxes, polish and a few gallons of Windex. ("For once, Viz' vanity came in handy," Flamestrike heard another femme murmur to Arcee.)

Non-essential personnel who were remotely curious about the project stood or sat about the perimeter, having been put there by the main photographer for blocking the light with their massive bodies. The femmes sat in a long line, each under the dedicated attention of two humans, mainly male.

"You're not a car or a plane," the woman who was rubbing polish on the right side of Flame's helm. "What are you?"

"She looks like this one here, Sandy," a thin, angular man perched atop Solarflare's strut said, spraying some liquid on the grey femme's facial planes in order to enhance their whiteness. "Some kind of bird."

After being admonished for moving at the beginning of her "make-up" session, Flame kept her head steady as she replied, "I'm a gryphon, my friend is an eagle."

Sandy's hands were oddly soothing as she moved to a new area on Flame's face. "Wow. So you're not limited to just cars and planes, then?"

"Obviously," someone muttered.

Sandy did not pause in her meticulous application, nor did she show any sign of acknowledging the speaker. Silently praising the woman for her courage, Flame continued the small talk, answering (within reason) any questions she had about the Autobots, particularly in regards to the odd male and female forms and mentalities they had.

With their day beginning at daybreak, the sun was just cresting the comm tower of Autobot City by the time Arcee, the first femme to be photographed, was led to the "stage" – a canopy of lights suspended on a black-metal structure. Watching from the sidelines, Flame was intrigued by the different ways the pink femme was encouraged to use her twin pistols.

Weapons seemed to be the theme of the whole shoot, though the photographers seemed to be interested in utilizing all the different "parts" the femmes came with: doorwings, jet wings … tails and pinioned wings. Being the last to stand before the flashing lights, Flamestrike found herself taking a long series of mental notes, particularly watching Solarflare and the way which she angled her body and made the most of her impressive span. For someone who thought the whole experience a lark (and professed naïveté), the grey avian femme seemed to be getting into the whole notion of robotic sensuality, her white face impassive yet her optics managing to convey smoldering glances at a point over the humans' heads. Hands raised, talons out; with pistol, without; wings fanned, closed; standing, sitting, squatting …

"Okay, Miss Flamestrike," Sandy said at her heel. "You're up."

_Mm? What? Oh … so … soon?_

Bladed tail swinging in a low, idle arc behind her, Flamestrike rose and padded over to where the _Maxim_ crew was shifting the set for their final shot of the day. She passed Solarflare on the way up, the other femme grinning in her usual fashion, crest arced high over her nasal ridge. "Have fun," the grey femme told her in passing, walking over to a long table where the others stood, looking at several monitors as their pictures were uploaded.

It was at this moment that Flame decided to feel out of sorts. She, of all the femmes, had the least amount of time to acclimate herself to the quirks of this world and its dominant species. Idly, she wondered if the humans would be so keen to adapt to the Cybertronian lifestyle, watch the newsvids, or play games if their positions were reversed. She'd met some keen individuals in the past, but they had been the Autobots' steadfast supporters from the beginning.

"Miss Flamestrike? Over here, please. There."

A tall, thin blond man standing behind a tripod gestured to the brown and flame-colored femme, who turned to fix him a confused look. "Here?" she asked, pointing to a mark in the grass.

"Yes," he replied a bit testily, lifting the camera from the tripod and putting it to his eye. "I see you have wings … spread them for me – no, higher. Can you fan the pinions? Okay, now, look at me, right here – are you looking at me? Bend a little, Miss Flamestrike, this isn't an execution. Give me a smile …"

_This is ridiculous_, she thought, arching her back and trying to keep her tail from being cut off. The director's cries of "loosen up" were beginning to annoy her. With a pleading look in Solarflare's direction, Flame tried a tight comm-link: _"Flare? C'mon … I thought I could do this. But … I can't!"_

"_Just loosen up, Flame,"_ came the serene reply. _"Really. It's okay. Let go."_

"_You're not helping,"_ the infiltration femme shot back, perturbed at her friend's laconic answer. Across the field, Solarflare merely smiled and shrugged, before answering Vision's nudge and gesture at a screen with a comment that did not reach Flamestrike.

Casting her optics to Primus, Flamestrike ran the others' performances in her cortex as the main photographer gave a grunt of impatience and stalked up to her. "Can you do this or am I wasting resources, Miss Flamestrike?"

The male's taunt did not pass through her audios without hitting something important. Gritting her dental plates, Flamestrike's tail gave one, angry lash before curling around her waist. "I'm sorry. What can we do with this?"

Eyes lighting up, the photographer began nodding to himself and stroking his chin. "Many things."

"It's detachable …"

"Perfect! Now, some music! _Music_!" he shouted, dancing backwards to begin his orders anew.

Having given up any semblance of her austere warrior mystic, Flamestrike found that if she really did let go, it was fun. She finally felt the power that came from so many people watching your every move – encouraging you. Later, she would look back on the memories of that day, and the pictures that followed, and wondered what possessed her to put her tail _there_, but for the moment, it was fun.

An hour and a half later, her photographer was finally satisfied, and the crew as a whole rejoiced. Flamestrike, tired but content, thanked the man who had put up with her earlier balking and moved to where the other femmes were sitting. Most of the crowd had dispersed, but there were a few mechs interested in taking a sneak peak at the unfinished product. Unfortunately for them, the monitors were closing down and the crew packing to leave.

Taking a seat by Solarflare, Flame leaned back. "So, when are we going to see the real thing?"

"In about a month, I was told," she replied, flexing her wings. "You looked good up there. See, didn't I tell you that letting go was a good thing?"

Tiny flamelets danced above the gryphonic femme's head in embarrassment. "You did," she admitted with a small smile.

Solarflare grinned and parted her lips to tack on some joke when a loud shriek pierced the air. "DRONE ATTACK!" Arcee bellowed as a truck exploded into a thousand pieces. The pink femme leapt up with surprising agility, whipping out her twin pistols in a movement so fast, Flame believed them to already be in her hands. "Autobots! Forward!"

Glancing skyward, Flamestrike saw a fan formation of black and silver creatures arcing through the sky, the figure of the Decepticon Mindwipe beating his small wingspan in background. The drones had no form, animal or machine. They were merely rectangles with wings and a double-barreled laser cannon strapped to their underbelly. That they were drones made them easy targets – it also meant that they could cause massive damage due to lacking sentience.

"Protect the humans!" someone shouted, and as one, the femmes began to back up, forming a barrier between the panicking, packing humans and the barrage of laser fire that was streaming their way. Flamestrike had her pistol at the ready, small cones of fire rising above her head in answer to her mounting battle fervor.

The drones dipped, spread out. A group began to concentrate fire beyond the femmes' ring, no doubt on Mindwipe's order.

"Solarflare!" Arcee shouted. "Get up there!"

Out of the corner of her optic, Flamestrike saw Flare hesitate for a moment, caught between the surprise of being ordered by a junior and the hail of laser fire that thudded inches from her huge black feet. Wrenching herself into altmode, the eagle-femme took off, the roar of her boosters and the white-blue flame that trailed after drifting down to the fight below.

Flame darted, knocking Vision to the side as a drone came thundering past. Spinning around, she cleaved the mechanoid in two with one swift cut of her tailblade. Hot battery acid sprayed her in the face as the creature exploded in a flurry of sparks. Crying out, Flame threw up her free arm, trying to wipe the corrosive from her delicate facial planes.

"MOVE!" a mech voice howled, and she was thrown sideways and onto the trampled grass by a figure that exploded from thin air. Mirage spun on the balls of his feet and simultaneously launched the rocket on his shoulder into the "faces" of four drones. "Are you all right?" he asked, hauling her to her feet as two City jets ripped into the fray, lancing by Mindwipe where he and Solarflare fought in mid-air.

"I –"she began as two more drones zoomed by. Instinctively, she raised her tailblade to seer them from the sky when one turned on its side, the _click_ of a detached bomb ringing in her audios. Mirage's howl fell on deaf audios as it dropped, filling her cortex with its explosion.


	8. The Recovery

Chapter Eight

_Sunlight, golden and deliciously warm, roused her from slumber. Along her back, skin twitched in momentary disappointment; a tufted ear flicked to vacate an adventurous fly from venturing too deep. One luminous emerald orb, than the other, opened to gaze across the green-gold plain. With a longing sigh, she stretched, feeling powerful muscles ripple from shoulder to flank, to the long, feather-tipped tail. In the same motion, the great, red-pinioned wings at her shoulders fanned out, drawing more of the sun's rejuvenating warmth into her body._

_With one more stretch, she stood, balancing her lean frame on a set of talons and a set of paws. Curious, she sniffed, drawing the golden afternoon into her nares, scenting for prey. The wind shifted, bringing along its delicate fingers the odor of gazelle … and of something that did not belong. A low rumble eased along her chest, rising up through her throat, carrying with it a hint of an eagle's angry keen._

_She sniffed again, tilting her avian head and stepping forth from the camouflaging cover of the brush. Canine … but not._

_With a snort and a growl, she shook herself, bunching powerful hindquarters that spurred her into a mighty leap forward. The air was too heavy for flight, but this did not mean she was powerless. A gryphon – a perfect melding of feline and avian – could run as well as she could fly. _

_It had better not be one of those ranging hyenas again. Shouldn't they have learned from the last time they tried to stake a claim in her territory?_

_Grass, warm and flexible, was flattened to the ground as she thudded over the plain, scattering the odd ground squirrel and rabbit, lest it, too, become prey. The interloper scent grew stronger as she raced on, drawing the wind into her lungs, letting it sing in her veins. Her pupils narrowed to mere pin-pricks, then suddenly flared until they seemed to dominate her eyes. One leap, then another carried her over a strange rise in the otherwise smooth plain. _

_An undignified squawk leapt from her throat at the scene that lay spread before her: a great sand-colored pyramid rose from sand so white, it gleamed as new-fallen snow. Seated upon a golden throne embossed with silver and bejeweled with sky-blue opals and cabochon-cut emeralds was a creature so black he seemed to be one with the shadows. Gold-leaf decorated about his white eyes – the shimmer of pearls and not the opaqueness of the blind – and the inside of each large, triangular ear. A plate collar of the same cut as the throne lay at the canid's thick throat; a simple loincloth covered his middle._

_As she padded, uncertain, atop the rise, the canid's angular head lifted, and he stared at her, mouth slightly open. Blinking gold-embossed lids, the man-shaped black dog crossed odd-jointed legs. "Now you," he began in a voice that carried across the sandy expanse as if he stood at her ear, "are someone whom I never expected to see. Your grey-plumed friend, yes, but you?"_

_Wispy memories flowed behind her eyes at his words. Taking her silence for the confusion that it was, the huge black man-jackal lifted his head to the clear blue sky, then fixed her with his pearly eyes. "Though you look to a foreign god of a metal world, it is to me that you have come. Most interesting. Come, then, gentle warrior – or, shall I say, Tears-of-the-Sky? Come to my side and safe you shall be while your living metal body heals."_

Tears-of-the-Sky_ … She shook her head as the wispy memories formed jagged points that were now stabbing into the soft, weak parts of her mind and soul. So formal … so … _old

_A name she had given up at the destruction of Iacon and her life as she had once lived it. "No," she breathed, liquid realization filling in the gaps created by the piercing memories. "Skytears was a softer soul who knew nothing of war, who would never think to raise her hand against another Cybertronian." She padded slowly, close to the canid and the pyramid. "And you – who are you?"_

_White fangs against pink gums and black lips gleamed. "You may call me 'Anubis'. I am the Guardian."_

------------------

Flowers, balloons, get-well cards and the odd plush decorated the bedside of the gryphonic femme. Solarflare sat by her side, as she had taken to doing over the past month that her friend had been in stasis-lock. Others had filled in when she could not: Trailbreaker, Hound, Windcharger … even Mirage and, Primus above, Prowl.

What Ratchet and First Aid could not figure out was why she was still locked. Her body's repairs had been concluded weeks ago; all connections from spark to greater system had checked out, yet, the one signal that remained distant was the one coming from her central processor.

"It's as if she's in a coma," Ratchet observed, visibly concerned. He ran tests and more tests, but they all came back with a variant on the same answer: Flamestrike slept, deeply. And what she dreamed of, not even the most advanced technology could discern.

What had been a full convalescence bay had dwindled to Flamestrike. The drones had wrecked massive amounts of damage upon the photo shoot, resulting in the deaths of two humans and the wounding of several more. More than one Autobot limped away from the battle with laser burns in his or her chassis. Solarflare bore long gashes in her wings and several deep holes in her legs where Mindwipe had tried to bite her into submission. Mirage, being mere feet from the explosion that knocked Flamestrike offline, spent a week and a half in traction, complaining now and then about how his cloaking mechanism had been thrown to hell and that they had better find a way to fix it because he was useless without it. Perceptor was able to locate parts and, with Wheeljack providing the engineering, the pair managed to cobble together a respectable duplicate for the spy's high-priced gadgetry.

Now there was but one.

A copy of the _Maxim_ special edition lay on the table beside Flamestrike, unopened.

"No change?"

Flare looked up from the newsfeed she was perusing and into the serene blue optics of Optimus Prime. "No," she sighed, turning to look at the monitor embedded into the slab's headboard. She'd stared at those figures so often, she nearly had them memorized. "It had to happen sometime, huh, Optimus?" Flare continued, voicing the thoughts that had plagued her these past weeks.

Glancing about, the supreme Autobot commander located a chair that would fit his bulk and took a spot on the other side of the berth. "Yes," he replied his tone low and a touch sad.

Quietly, Flare nodded. Optimus' huge chest rumbled with his own sigh, and he glanced around the tiny corner of the recovery bay, noting the gifts from well-wishes. "A chess set?"

Solarflare peered over her strut. "Oh … Prowl plays against himself sometimes while he sits."

"Why don't we play a round or two, Solarflare?"

A pack of cards appeared in the grey femme's taloned hand as she asked hopefully, "Cribbage?"

* * *

The subtle shuffle of crystal on tile. Murmured comments. The give and take of her ventilators. The steady beat of her Energon pump.

Thoughts, fleeting like feathers on a warm summer breeze, flickered before Flamestrike's inner optics before vanishing, leaving her with the sense that something great had happened, and now she completely forgot it all.

Sniffing, she caught the barest whiff of a vaguely canine scent before it, too, disappeared. Vision returned, slowly: spotty, grainy and in black and white. "Uhhh …"

"Quiet. Let me get Ratchet."

A voice, familiar. And she slipped under once more.

* * *

Idly, Flamestrike flipped through the magazine that had nearly been her last act on earth. Overall, she was pleasantly surprised, even mildly embarrassed at the fact that the femme whose tail was poised in such a provocative manner was, in reality, her! There wasn't much to impress her, but she _did_ like the fold-out poster that had all ten of them in a row – which was amusing, because they had never formed a chorus line. Silently, the gryphonic femme praised the geniuses who had managed to "Photoshop" the warriors into a convincible group shot.

"So, what do you think?" Flare asked as Flamestrike folded the magazine closed and put it on a rolling tray at her right. She would have placed it on the nightstand, but that was covered with every conceivable get-well token imaginable.

"I think I'll put that poster above my bunk." Giving Flare a smile, Flamestrike reached out and grabbed for a tall cup of oil that also occupied the tray. Someone, probably Flare, thought it funny to stick a huge human straw into the liquid.

Though saddened by the loss of human life, the brown and flame-colored femme was grateful that none of her fellow Autobots had taken anything worse than she had.

"Want to try a walk around the bay again?" Flare suggested.

_If I do another circuit, my servos are going to pop – even the new ones!_ "Mm, no, not right now. Maybe later."

Flare nodded. "Well, don't blame me if you get the riot act from Ratchet about strengthening those supports," she chuckled softly. "If you need me, I'm just a comm-call away."

"Yes, creator," Flamestrike answered dutifully with a small smile of her own.

When she had left, Flame settled against the headboard, picking up the newest feed that Solarflare had gratefully left on her chair. A month out of the loop, Flame was quite content to just sit here with her restructured legs propped up, a Kevlar pillow behind her back and catch up. They had never been able to explain the sudden attack by Mindwipe and his drones; Ultra Magnus concluded that the Decepticon mystic had just taken it upon himself to do as much damage as he could. There was no information present in the recovered drone bodies – just layer upon layer of instructions. Red Alert, however, was not satisfied and beefed up security: there were hidden cameras and auto-guns stationed around the huge perimeter a few days after the ambush.

Once she had drained the lukewarm oil down to its dregs, Flamestrike counted herself caught up – enough to want to turn on the vidscreen that hung from the ceiling and watch _The Young and the Restless_.

"I have a suggestion, if you are open to it."

The unexpected progenitor of the voice was enough to tear Flame from a particularly intriguing plot point. Prowl was walking towards her from the main bay entrance, a small box in his hands. "Suggestion?" she echoed, confused and slightly flustered by his sudden appearance.

"Well, I can't have my best agent souring while she recovers, now can I?"

_Am I … dreaming?_

But no, there it was: that small, quirking grin that she had almost bitten Solarflare's grey head off for. It was just as fleeting now as before; Prowl's facial planes quickly slipped into their usual mien and he sat down in the chair vacated by the grey femme two hours before. Shifting on the berth, Flame peered into the open box. "Well, no," she conceded. "What is it?"

"Swing that tray around." Once it was in place, Prowl began to meticulously unpack the contents and set them with precise movements onto the simple wooden board. "Chess," he continued as he put the pieces in order. "A strategy game similar to _Envergo_ on Cybertron. I take it you've played?"

Peering at the pieces, Flame shook her head. "Not really."

"Indeed?" Prowl paused in his set-up and looked right into her green glass optics, his brow ridge furrowed. "I find that hard to believe."

"Because I'm so good at getting in and out of places?" she asked with a laugh, and was rewarded with a slight – dare she say, embarrassed? – smile in return. "Never played. I guess I've always relied on two things: agility and instinct. I used to be a runner for the Council, so I always had to be somewhere five nanoclicks previous. In and out with a missive or two, then onto the next."

Prowl nodded. Obviously, he'd read this somewhere in her personal file. "Well, I shall count you as a quick learner."

Even if Flamestrike _had_ heard that Prowl was rarely taken in a chess match, she couldn't have cared less. She missed the one-on-one interaction that she had come to relish over the past few months, the close-working atmosphere that was two heads, two cortexes, pressed together, working as one to solve a particularly nasty problem.

Prowl's assumption was right on the money. Once the tactician laid out the basics, he did not go easy on her. Through trial and error, and more than one lost pawn, Flame's understanding grew. Prowl beat her every time, but she did manage to keep the king a little longer.

The set itself was simple: polished black and grey granite pieces arranged on a cedar board, the spaces marked in similar colors. The game might have had a humble origin, but Flame could tell that the pieces were well-cared for, despite being used so often. The board even carried a faint hint of recent varnishing.

Well into their sixth round, distant thunder rumbled down the bay's expanse. Though Prowl did not look up, the set of his lip components and brow ridge spoke volumes: the Dinobots were coming.

More accurately – _one_ Dinobot was thudding into the bay. The great bulk of the Brachiosaur Sludge tramped along the floor with a Dinobot's usual unfettered glee. Turning his wedge-shaped yellow head this way and that, Sludge finally zeroed in on where Flamestrike was situated. "Ahh … Sludge see Flamebird awake. Have present for pretty catbird."

"Sludge …" Prowl cautioned, but the Dinobot was already making his way over to where they were sitting. Rather, all he had to do was take a few steps and turn his head, he was that large.

Inclining his head, Sludge extended his long neck until the tip of his blunt snout was at Flamestrike's propped-up feet. As the femme watched, wide-optic'd with curiosity, a small pink form in a silver jumpsuit shimmied over the back of Sludge's head and slid down the long expanse.

"I made this for you in art class, Miss Flamestrike!" The only offspring of the Autobots' oldest human allies, Spike and Carly Witwicky, stood on the end of Sludge's nose while the Dinobot proceeded to go cross-optic'd watching him. Daniel Witwicky held out a slightly sticky, but elaborately stickered wooden box. "I even painted a flame a'top for you," he told her proudly. "And your name."

Flame leaned against the Kevlar-padded pillow, quite taken aback by the young human male's generosity and thoughtfulness. The simple fact that she'd had such limited contact with humans – especially the Witwicky clan – and that Daniel had taken the time to remember her, touched her more deeply than any other gift that surrounded her bedside. "I'm honored, Danny," she told the boy, watching him blush with pleasure. "Let me see, where should I put it?" As she turned to make a show of finding the best spot for the gift, Daniel hopped up and down at her feet, turning to Sludge.

"See? I told ya she'd like it!"

Sludge bobbed his head up and down. "Yes, yes, like it …" The Dinobot's saurian face stretched into a wide grin, as if he, too, had spent so much time and effort on the project as the boy had. "Like it …"

_Thump! Thump!_ went the Dinobot's long tail, its heaviness and the careless ease Sludge wielded his limitless strength enough to cause the walls to shake and the beds that lined them to start jiggling along the floor.

"Sludge!" Prowl called out sharply, rising from his seat as Flamestrike rolled off the berth and onto the floor, vibrations echoing along her new joints.

Abruptly, the proud thumping ceased. At the end of the bed, Sludge's face pulled down into a downward slope that would have been comic had not the Dinobot's feelings been so adamantly true. "Sludge apologize," he murmured.

From her position on the floor, Flamestrike saw the shift of metal "muscles" as Sludge swung his huge tail around from behind in a great arc that knocked Prowl's chess set from the tray, cleaving the lovely cedar in twain and smashing the granite pieces into disrepair. The motion complete, Sludge stared at the damage with the tip of his tail stuck in his mouth, optics canted sorrowfully. What had merely been an expression of sparkling embarrassment and solace turned into destruction.

Having seen the same shift as Flame had, Prowl jumped backwards, lest he suffer the loss of limb and not just the loss of his beloved board.

"What is this racket?" Ratchet hollered, stomping into the recovery bay with as much _oomph_ to his step as the Dinobot naturally generated. "Sludge, get your ugly bulk out of my bay – **PRIMUS**. _Where is my patient!?_"

"Here," Flamestrike offered, setting one leg, then the other, under her and rising with no help from the berth.

"Get out, get out!" Ratchet chanted at Sludge, until the Brachiosaur with his human passenger slowly trudged out of the bay, his tail clamped tightly against his haunches. "Now, let me have a look at you …"

Wearily, Flame allowed the CMO to examine her. Her answers came in monosyllables as she watched Prowl wordlessly pick up the shattered pieces of his chess set and reverently place them within their box. Saying nothing more, he left.


	9. The Chess Set

Chapter Nine

_Beneath the heavy leaf cover, Flamestrike peered across the white sands. _

"_Feline and avian must work in sync; neither must be the dominant force controlling your actions," the great black jackal had said. _

"_But, I was told to never let my 'instincts' dominate me. I am to rely on them as a second set of senses, not as my main computing function."_

"_That is logic speaking, plain and simple," he continued, his tail swinging in an idle arc beneath the crisp, white loincloth. "Logic dictates that in order to be in control of your surroundings, then you must have full control of yourself. In that, your Prowl believes more deeply than in his god, the metalloid Primus. Truthfully, it binds him, restricts him to one viewpoint. There is a world out there, broader, more brilliant, than the stark black and white of logic."_

"_You insist on giving me the qualities of organics," she said, curling her tail about her sand-golden haunches._

_He turned, ears canted slightly to the sides. "We are all the products of outsiders. I am the Guardian; that was the role bestowed upon me by the Universe. Man bequeathed me a form and a function that, to this day, I perform without question. Your form was bequeathed to you in order to survive; you still perform your intended function, but you must make allowances. You are no longer a 'car'; you are, for all intents and purposes, an 'animal'. And for as long as you wear this form, that is who you _are_."_

_Quietly, Flamestrike had sat, letting the warm desert oasis breeze play through her real feathered crest. She was a Cybertronian, first and foremost; if Anubis was to be believed, she was an animal second. An animal Cybertronian. "Form dictates function," she had said at last._

"_Do not believe the truth to be a death knell to your soul," the Guardian admonished gently. "It may turn out to be your greatest asset."_

_Beneath the broad leaves, Flamestrike gazed across the sands, towards the pyramids beyond. In the distance, an eagle cried. Through far-seeing emerald eyes, the gryphoness watched as a great grey eagle alighted the tallest pyramid … and met her gaze despite the distance._

---------------

Summer was slowly turning into the coolness of fall when the package arrived a day earlier than she expected it to. Perhaps the company, having seen the delivery address, decided that prompt service would be in their best interests. Whatever the reason, it gave Flamestrike an extra day to inspect the contents before she could present it properly.

She had told no one of her intentions, not even Solarflare. For while the femme had her confidence, she also had Flamestrike's permission to be candid. And that candidness might deter Flamestrike from going through with what her common sense was already trying to prevent. No, it was going to be a mission – a personal mission, but she would approach it like any other Decepticon hideaway.

_And if you leave a little battered and bruised, well, no mission is without its scars,_ she reminded herself, giving the last onyx piece a final inspection before tucking it back into the box.

It would have been silly to ignore the stories. More than once, Flare had related some tale about Prowl and his "fangirls". In more serious tones, and with sidelong glances at her friend, she spoke of the hearts Prowl had broken – unintentionally. He didn't need anyone, Flare said softly, before reminding herself with a nervous flick of her crest to whom she was conversing; with surprising alacrity, she switched subjects.

In the week following her discharge from Ratchet's medbay, the one thing on Flamestrike's mind were the broken chess pieces, their well-loved little bodies smashed to disrepair. She didn't want Prowl to think that she was trying to replace what had obviously been something of importance to him; rather, she hoped he would take it for the thank-you gift it was meant to be. A pale comparison, if you will.

If the City treasurer noticed the huge drop in her account, well, it wasn't his place to mention. It cost more than the five-hundred dollars listed for the human-sized set to craft one in Transformer proportions. Especially if that set was sculpted to resemble figures from an ancient human religion on their African continent.

Flame wasn't quite sure what drew her to the Egyptian set, but she let instinct guide her hand to log in her City credit numbers after some intense dealing with the company. On the whole, it seemed rather natural to hold the hawk-headed king in her hands, to gaze at the lion-headed queen.

The next day Flamestrike took herself and her package to Prowl's office for their usual meeting. Jiggling the box gently against her breast-plates, Flame punched the codes on his door and admitted herself when the pneumatic hissing came to a rest. The tactician was seated at his table grid, setting up for the day's planning attempts. Two neat rows of Autobot and Decepticon markers were out of their boxes and perched on the table's edge, easy at hand.

"Flamestrike, good. I want to review the formation from the other day. I have been turning the problem for quite some time, and I believe if we set up an observation post on the coast …" The white and black tactician looked up as she came in and set the box down in the middle of the planning grid. His brilliant blue optics took in the plain brown cardboard container, its four sides offering no clue as to the contents. "What is this?"

Within, Flame's ventilators accepted the large intake of air as she tried to cool her heating system. With practiced ease, she slid into her normal position opposite Prowl. "I have something for you," she said at last, acutely aware of how her vocalizer shaped the words.

"Oh?" Prowl cocked his head to the side in an uncanny imitation, folding his hands before him on the table.

As casually as she could, Flamestrike pushed the box towards him, her optics sweeping over the grid layout in an effort to school her thoughts into some semblance of coherency. Across from her, Prowl took the box and began to unpack the layers of cotton that swathed each piece, setting the bubble wrap aside. From under studious ridges, Flamestrike watched as his own brow band jumped in an unusual show of surprise. The tactician's mouth dropped slowly, and he turned the first piece – the white marble queen, Hathor – over in his long-fingered hands. One by one, the onyx and marble pieces found their way to the tabletop, followed at last by the large cedar board.

Prowl looked up, his optics slightly wide. "Flamestrike … this is magnificent. But, I must ask – why?"

She shifted slightly. "Because of what Sludge did to your first set. I know I can't replace what was obviously a precious set, but I figured you'd like to keep your skills up to par."

There was silence, a quiet that stretched for nanoclicks. _You're warrior enough to handle rejection_, she reminded herself, trying to ease the unconscious clenching of her dental plates.

Just as she was about to concede defeat and the loss of a few hundred credits, Prowl began to clear the faction markers from the table, sweeping them up in a careless gesture and dumping them into a box he had next to his foot on the floor. "All right, agent," he said, setting up the new board, giving her the marble queen Hathor and the king – a tall, pointed-ear piece in the form of the jackal-headed god, Anubis. With an ease born of long hours, Prowl had everything set up and he leaned over the table, looking across to her expectantly. "Your move."

Surprised, Flamestrike hitched herself further forward, flicking her tail over her thighs and settling her wings against her trilythium spine. For all that Prowl did not hold back, they sallied back and forth for over an hour, neither giving much ground to their opponent. At last, Prowl's long fingers slipped over the form of Hathor and replaced her with Sekhmet: "Checkmate."

Across the table, Flamestrike gave in to a sparkling's pout, put out by her loss, but not too sore about it. She had thought she'd taken the upper hand well into the half-hour, but Prowl, with his vast knowledge and battle computer, managed to out-wit her at the last moment, taking control with an ease that was almost supernatural. Once she conceded defeat, Prowl scooped up the pieces and began to rearrange them into their starting positions, when he stopped, his optic sensors flicking with what seemed unease behind that beautiful blue glass.

"I believe that was the best game I have seen you play, Flamestrike," he said at last. "One would wonder if you were trying to seduce me with your skill."

Spinal column stiffening, Flamestrike's tail fell from her lap and atop her head, tiny flamelets of embarrassment flickered. Prowl continued, his vocalizer steady if his hands were not – fumbling slightly while replacing a sphinx pawn: "I'm sure you've heard the stories by now from Solarflare, if not the other femmes. But, here is the truth: I do not find myself in need of a partner of that sort – mech or femme."

It was a rather arrogant statement, if taken by itself. But Flamestrike, trained in noticing the flaws in a structure, observed a slight tic by the tactician's right optic as he spoke. Shaking off her sparkling shyness, she straightened her shoulder plates, flicking her tail back over her thighs. "I thought I _was_ your partner, Prowl. If not, why am I still here? Why do you need me at all if this is the case?"

"You misunderstood …" the tactician replied, floundering for the first time in their short acquaintance.

Slowly, Flamestrike stood up. "I don't know how to seduce anyone. But, how can I stand here, day after day, and not be in awe of you, Prowl?" She looked down at the abandoned game, then back at the wide-optic'd grey face of the tactician. "You've taught me so much, and for that, I thank you. I hope I have made you proud."

Those blue optics dropped to the table and slowly, Prowl shook his head. "What do you want of me, Flamestrike?"

"One night, one minute – if that is all you can spare," she said at last, surprising herself with the confidence and audacity with which she spoke.

Prowl did not meet her gaze; instead, he stood up and walked past her towards the door. Without a word, he left, leaving the brown and flame-colored femme alone, with only chess pieces to see her tears.

* * *

Transforming, Prowl set his wheels to the road, crossing the great bridge with its gouts of white-water foaming and crashing over the huge turbines that helped to power the City. He drove to clear his befuddled cortex, not to run away as he was certain it would be labeled. How many times had he had human females and femmes throw themselves at his feet, begging him to be with them? The former was impossible, if not improbable – the latter, well, for the longest time, he had existed on his own. Vons upon vons, Prowl had worked for others – and with them – but never to the extent where he had grown emotionally attached to a certain individual _in that way_.

_Ah, but you lie_, his logical side told him sternly.

Night, cool and comforting, with the scent of late-summer flowers floating through the air, covered the cruiser as he traveled at the proper speed for the highway. With a low rumble of his engine, Prowl was forced to admit that he had been caught by his own logic. In the early days of the war, he had been tempted and caught by a femme who had capitalized on her victim's relative youth and passion. Against the better judgment of the older Prowl, his younger self let his heart lead him down a path that had almost led to his termination. While he did not hold the femme's Decepticon allegiance against others of her mental gender and form, it was an experience he did not care to repeat. Even if it meant swearing off of tactile contact … forever.

Several yards ahead, there was a wide dirt shoulder; Prowl signaled his intent to pull over and swung in that direction, turning about so that his headlights faced the road. There, he idled in body, but not in mind.

_So many females of either species_, he sighed, flashing his lights as a warning to a driver whose passenger was leaning a little too far out the window. Did they know how their amorous advances were working against them? For each blubbering fool, each prostrating and sensual female who came before him, he retreated further and further until he was certain no more of those emotions remained.

_And then _she_ came along._ Prowl sighed, almost in contempt at the use of the literary cliché. Logical, strong, independent, Flamestrike's skill had impressed him from the beginning – and before that. Her dossier did not idle in his tray; he had taken it directly to Prime, almost insisting that the Autobot commander bring her to Earth. And when she was here, neither skill nor talent was exaggerated. For every successful mission, his estimation grew – to the point where he had taken her to his side, to use her knowledge in tandem with his strategies to formulate some of the best frontal attacks and infiltration missions in all his long years.

But, the question remained …

Obviously, Flamestrike felt differently about their working relationship. Battlefield love was strenuous for both parties; more often than not, such devotion did not survive the end of the war. Domesticity and routine paled in comparison to the non-stop action; reliance stumbled and slipped to the point of resentment. Mirage and Solarflare were not the only couples in Autobot City; true, they seemed to be the most prominent because of their ranks, but they were certainly not alone. Oddly enough, for his dismissal of battlefield love, logic told him that they would be one of the few who made it.

Mirage.

If there was one mech in the City who could keep information to himself – and from his bondmate if it was required – it was Mirage. And though Prowl was loathe to admit it, he needed the Ligier's advice.

"_Mirage."_

"_This had better be good,"_ came the reply, several seconds late, low and sardonic. _"Flare's been strung for days, and you just interrupted my attempt to unwind her …"_

"_Send her my apologies, but I am in need of your counsel."_

Along the tight link, there was a ripple of barely-controlled surprise. Quickly, Mirage gathered himself. _"I see,"_ he said slowly, the pause between his communication evidence that he was relaying the cruiser's words to his mate. _"We're on the northwest face of Lookout Mountain. Let me know when you're nearby."_

_Well, what did you say about battlefield love?_ his logical side commented wryly. With another sigh that rattled his suspension, Prowl eased off the shoulder, pausing to check on-coming traffic before turning his lights onto the highway.

At this time of the evening, there was a decrease in commuter activity, but enough to keep his inner policeman occupied, tallying violations and filing them away for when he was able to access the Chattanooga police computers.

Despite the load on his cortex, Prowl had not driven far from the City, and was able to drive up to the mountain within an hour. Respectfully, he sent a tight, pulsed signal to the Ligier spy and received the echo not a moment later. Transforming, the white and black cruiser ascended the mountain, familiarity with the landscape allowing his feet to find the correct paths while his cortex still wandered down alien trails. Edging around a particularly thin corner, Prowl found Mirage and Solarflare perched near the ledge, the Ligier cradling his grey bondmate in his arms as they sat, looking up at the sparkling stars.

Mirage heard him first, but it was Solarflare's body language that confirmed their acknowledgement of his arrival. In one graceful, lithe motion, Solarflare stood up, her broad wings flicking out, then slicking to her spine; Mirage's hand trailed from hers, and she leaned down to kiss him before letting go. With a questioning glance behind her, the grey avian femme merely bounced off the ledge, transforming and winging away with huge sweeping motions of her black pinions, the dull roar of her boosters echoing. _Perhaps he did not tell her as much as I suspected_, Prowl thought, walking over to the white and blue spy, who was still staring off into the night.

"Have a seat," Mirage said with a graceful gesture, a relic from his elite days. Glancing about at the rocky ground, Prowl scuffed a patch clean and took up residence at the spy's right. When Mirage turned to face the cruiser, there was a soft set to his light blue facial planes, stained silver in the moonlight. Then, as smoothly as he transformed from robot to Ligier, Mirage's expression slid to his business mien. "What can I do for you, Prowl?"

With his blood-red chevron riding low over his brow ridge, Prowl folded his hands on his knees, looking out and over the ledge, beyond to the gleaming City. "I need your advice on a personal matter."

There were many reasons why Prowl had settled on the spy, other than for his own trials in love. Mirage did not blurt out phrases such as "_You_, Prowl? You need _my_ advice?" as some others would. Rather, the Ligier nodded thoughtfully. "Let's have it."

The spy listened intently, never interrupting throughout the whole recital. Though his vocalizer was tight in the beginning, Mirage's non-judgmental facial set was enough to get Prowl to loosen up and reveal the majority of his apprehensions – just not the most important road block.

After Prowl was through, Mirage was quiet; indeed, he looked at his own slim black hands for a few nanoclicks. "The old me would take her up on her offer without a second's pause, and to leave before the sun rises," he said at last. "But this is my advice to you: accept her proposal. If it's one night or one round, Flamestrike is prudent enough to keep her lip components shut. She is also warrior enough to stick to her assignments and not let what happened get in the way." He paused to collect his thoughts and Prowl nodded, turning the Ligier's words over, sensing the truth and merit. "Do you know what was different about Flare?" Mirage asked in a moment of introspection.

"I believe so," Prowl answered when he realized Mirage wished a response.

The spy rocked back on his hands, crossing his legs at the ankle joints. "She never wanted my money, my prestige; she didn't care who I had been. She saw the mech behind the façade … and she _listened_. You are starting to see what I did, Prowl. You're seeing a partner, a femme who isn't swayed by your good looks, who wants prostrate herself before you or send her undergarments first-class."

"Or nude photos," the cruiser admitted wryly.

Mirage grinned. "That, too. So," he continued, the smile slipping from his facial planes as he grew serious, "my advice to you is not to make the same mistake I did. That is, if you feel the same way?"

_Do I?_ Prowl thought, breaking optic-contact with the Ligier for a brief moment. Humans had among them those who claimed they could read the future in the stars, that these distant suns spoke to them.

Taking the cruiser's silence for the indecision it was, Mirage continued, "If anything, apologize to her for the seduction comment. And count yourself lucky Ratchet and First Aid didn't equip her with taloned hands."

Logic swirled around with emotion, each a wave pounding against the shell that was his cortex. "Thank you, Mirage. I appreciate your time."

"Of course," the Ligier said as Prowl stood up, brushing bits of mountain rock from his shin guards. In the distance, a black shadow wheeled, bringing with it the low roar of twin boosters. Solarflare was making her return. Into the darkness Prowl walked, leaving them alone; he traversed the steep slopes and small paths until he reached the parking lot. There, he transformed and drove away, so many thoughts and possibilities vying for his immediate attention that he almost ran over a raccoon. With a squeal of tires and the bleat of a startled animal, Prowl righted himself and forced his concentration to the road ahead.

_Do you feel the same way, Prowl?_ he asked himself as he made the turn into the City and flashed his access code to the sentry on duty. Rolling to a stop on the parade grounds, he lifted himself from carmode and trekked into the City, hands behind his back, lost in thought and indecision.

Flamestrike had fallen under the spell that had captured so many hearts and broken them so quickly. Prowl had never made himself out to be such a magnet for affection and attention, but it was there, and there was no denying the power he had over females. _But, you have to understand that it took a long time to get to this point_, he told himself, riding the elevator back to his office in a vain hope of finding her there. _And Mirage, for all his odd ways, hit the nail on the head. You found someone who understands you, shares the same pattern of thought. It was only natural for her to assume that you would somehow feel the same._

_After all this time, can you reciprocate? Can you put aside the vons?_

Though he would later attribute it to a City ventilator in need of repair, at that moment, a dry, knowing laugh echoed around in his head. Glancing ceiling-ward, Prowl located the source and made a mental note to approach Grapple in the morning.

A quick inspection of his office revealed no brown and flame-colored gryphonic femme perched at the planning table. Indeed, everything was as he had left it – the chess set three-quarters assembled, the light of the grid still balefully green.

Well, she could not be with Solarflare, for the grey comm officer was otherwise occupied. Acting on a whim, if not a dash of logic, Prowl turned around and headed for the soldiers' quarters. As he walked and rode through the levels, the longer he had to spin his problem into some semblance of coherency – and truth.

And it was due to his cluttered cortex that he was mildly surprised to find that Flamestrike was in residence when he rang her buzzer. She stood in the doorway, mouth hanging open, crest slick against her helm. In that moment, Prowl threw logic out the window and asked, "May I still take you up on your offer?" She might have replied, but he could not recall what that might have been, for there was a distinct sound in the back of his cortex that jingled exactly like the breaking of glass.

Quietly, Flamestrike stepped back from the doorway and he followed, letting the hiss of the doors close on his old life.


	10. The Reveal

Chapter Ten

It was a rather new experience for the tactician – sneaking out of a night rendezvous' quarters. How many times had he walked the halls of the City and disciplined the teenage progeny of the humans who worked there for their illicit affairs? How many couples had he caught hiding in the Autobots' shower facility? Too many – and now he was, effectively, one of them.

Logic dictated that he should be feeling no shame, for he was an "adult" and entitled to his privileges as an officer. Then why did he slowly disengage himself from Flamestrike's rangy form so as not to bring her online? And why did his optics flicker right and left as he carefully palmed the door open? _I do believe they call mechs like you a "fool"_, he thought with wry sadness, glancing over his shoulder before stepping into the hall.

"Good morning, Prowl."

Casually, the black and white cruiser swung to his left; there was Hound, walking towards him, a cart of spare parts idling behind the green Jeep. Normally, Prowl would have been wondering why the mech had a hovercart on the dormitory level; this morning, he was only concerned with what Hound had seen. "Good morning, Hound," he returned smoothly. "Today's your day off, isn't it?"

The tracker shrugged, a tic above his upper lip component betraying his outer calm. "Yeah, but Hoist needed some help refurbishing one of the old berths. Figured I'd give him a hand."

There was truth behind the statement, but underneath his words, there was something _more_. Prowl noted how the tracker's sensors swept to Flamestrike's door, then back to the Datsun. They locked optics briefly, deep blue meeting cold cerulean, and that one moment between them told Prowl all he needed to know. With a friendly nod in Hound's direction, the cruiser made for the elevator. _First Solarflare, now Flamestrike_, Prowl found himself ruminating as he rode the lift to the bottom and stepped out into the lobby. The morning receptionist was arranging things on her desk when he walked by, and he gave the young woman a polite nod in response to her greeting and good wishes.

Could he really fault the green tracker? Prowl had found himself slightly interested in the grey femme many years ago, just has Hound had been – and who was to say that Hound still carried a plasma-flame for Solarflare, even today? Logic dictated otherwise for Prowl (helped along, no doubt, by Mirage's not-so-subtle suggestion that he look elsewhere), yet now he had become involved with another winged femme. One who was not attached – but the object of Hound's affection, regardless.

_And you can't even bring yourself to say that Hound is welcome to her_, he murmured, surprised. _Because … you want her for yourself._

The cement was warm under his tires as he transformed and drove along the bridge that housed the City's powerful turbines for the second time in two days. The admission did not surprise him; it was the same conclusion to which he had come to last night.

_Then, Prowl, why are you running?_

_No, there is no running, only time for reflection_, he was quick to counter as he swung through the gates.

_Hypocrite_, came the wry rejoinder.

Sun-warmed blacktop radiated soothing heat into his Cybertronian tires; it threaded along his trylithium axels, throughout his metallic skeleton. Prowl gave a casual flick of his windshield wipers, as a human would have contentedly blinked. _I suppose … it can be done_, he considered thoughtfully, before a speeding tan Chevrolet Lumina crossed his sensors; it was then his inner law enforcer took over, and he momentarily forgot about the femme he'd left in her quarters.

* * *

She wasn't surprised to find him gone. Despite his words during the dark hours of the day, a small part of her core processor was preparing her in the event that he would leave. Flame would have preferred that they mutually part, if that was his decision – but to sneak away? Well, that went against every logical circuit in his metalloid body. It rallied against everything she had come to associate him with – the partner she had come to know over the Earthen months. 

And that left her rather disappointed.

Popping shoulder servos, Flamestrike rose, flicking her tail back into place. Several items in her small room had been … rearranged during the course of the night. Setting servos, springs and hydraulics to her recharging bed, the gryphonic femme angled it back into place along the wall. Settling the cup of styluses back on her desk, she grabbed a low-grade mug of oil, two ion sticks and left her room. The orange tile chimed gently under her feet, ringing counterpoint to the miasma that was her thoughts. _You promised that you would let it go, if it came down to this_, she told herself, hunching her shoulder plates with determination. _But, it's always easier to make promises_.

Regardless, she had a job to do. And doing a job well was what she had been rebuilt for.

The ion sticks were closely followed by the lukewarm oil. Wiping her lip components with the back of her wrist, Flame tossed the cup into the nearest recycling bin, her system reacting to the low-level power boost with an increase in her step. As she waited for the elevator, Hound plodded up to her, stopping so suddenly that the empty grav-bed he was totting slammed against his knee supports.

"Mornin'," the femme greeted the Jeep. Hound looked at her, his facial planes drawn downwards; lines that were invisible when he wore a carefree, expressive mien suddenly appeared, crafting his grey face into a craggy parody. Though she didn't know him too well, as he spent much of his time in the native woodlands of Earth, Hound was fast friends with Flare and Mirage, and Flamestrike knew that this was not his usual attitude. Surprised, she peered at the tracker. "Are you all right?"

A shadow slipped across those grey planes. Between one nanoclick and the next, Hound switched his posture, slipping with a shrug into the easy stance he was known for: "I will be," he said at last, giving her a nod. Bypassing the brown and flame-colored femme, the Jeep took his grav-bed around the corner, to the next available transport. Flame watched him go – then her attention was caught by the chiming of the lift.

The elevator swung open, displaying two EDC officers; they noted Flamestrike and politely stepped into a corner of the lift. Flame inclined her head and hit the code for Prowl's office's level.

_Hm_, Flamestrike noted to the ceiling, dismissing the encounter and turning her thoughts elsewhere. The elevator discharged the two EDC personnel and dropped Flame off at hers.

Flamestrike stepped out, her tail swinging behind her in a lazy arc. Her wings rustled lightly at her shoulders, the only outward indication of uneasiness in her trylithium frame.

Brown and flame-colored, she idled at the security panel by Prowl's office. She knew the codes – one of a handful of Autobots who did. But her cortex was not on the codes; she could punch them in her offline hours. Everything was as she had left it the night before: the chess set with its beautiful pieces sat in the center of the strategy table. With a sigh, Flame packed them away and stowed the box under the holotable. Perching on her stool, she wrapped her tail around her waist, dangling the tri-bladed edge between her thighs. Arms folded on the table's edge, she powered the unit; deft grey digits tapped the long pad sitting at her right, calling up a program that she and Prowl had been working on for a week.

As she ran the program through a fourth set of alterations, a soothing chime rang. Jerking her head from where she pillowed them on her arm bracers, Flamestrike spun around. "Yes?"

"_It's me,"_ a familiar femme voice echoed. _"Are you busy?"_

Flame punched the door open so suddenly that Solarflare's crest banged against the top of her helm. Her golden optics swept the room for Prowl's presence before entering. The grey avian walked around to the other side of the planning table, perching atop the other stool. She looked down at the expanse, her head tilting as she studied the maneuvers. "So …"

"Prowl and I spent the night together," Flamestrike stated matter-of-factly over the top of her bracers, eying the holographic strike and not liking the outcome. The admission was hollow to her audios. She paused the program and redesigned the maneuver. Her optics flickered over Solarflare's face; her alabaster facial planes twitched in mild surprise.

"Really? Well, congratulations. But … he's not here …"

The program ran smoothly; Flame saved it and filed it away for the next strategy meeting. Flare's face was set with open honesty and confusion. "No, he left. I guess it wasn't meant to be, despite the things said."

The grey communications officer sighed with sympathy. "I'm sorry, Flamestrike. We thought it would have worked out."

_We_?

Flare's crest twitched with the knowledge that she let something slip. Flamestrike voiced her query and across the table and Flare's optic shutters flickered. "Mirage and I." She shifted, paused and then shrugged, as if she had gone too far and preferred the truth instead of hedging. Her wings chimed over her shoulder struts as she lay her hands on the table. "Well, mostly me. Anyway, he and I were out on Lookout Point the other night when Prowl came up. Mirage asked me to leave and when I returned, he told me that Prowl had asked him for some advice. That being unusual in of itself, I figured that it had to do with you."

Flamestrike nodded absently, toying with the keypad. "Well, I had my night. It's time to move on." In a show of how much she had acclimated to Earth and humanity, she cleared her metallic throat, listening to the rattle of her vocalizer against the hollow chamber.

"I'm sorry …"

Before the gryphonic femme could remonstrate her friend for the surplus sympathy, the office doors swung in with a sweet pneumatic hiss. There was Prowl, his doorwings slightly askew, chevron riding high on his brow. Her olfactory sensors caught the scent of pavement rolling off of his warm tires, which idly spun over his shoulders and at his feet.

"If you do not mind, Solarflare, we have work to do."

Rising from her crouch over her bracers, Flamestrike's lip components parted in a soundless exclamation. She looked from Prowl to the junior comm officer; Solarflare was staring at the white and black cruiser, resting pointed chin on taloned hand. And she was smiling. "Aye, Prowl." With a flickering wink in Flame's direction, Solarflare pushed herself to her feet and practically skipped out the door.

Slowly, Prowl shook his head and walked across the room to take up the seat vacated by Solarflare. He said nothing, merely going through the program she had just saved. Flamestrike watched his face, but it was set into its usual impassive mien. She could not read him – not today.

"This will work amazingly well with the new intelligence reports we received concerning Terrorcon activity in Florida," he murmured at last, rewinding one scenario and setting the program to view the data from another angle. With a thick forefinger, Prowl banished the image. Without looking at her, though Flamestrike had risen in her seat, he leaned under the table and pulled out the chess set. "I never gave you the chance for a rematch," he said quietly, placing the carved box on the edge. With his usual precision, he unpacked the contents, turning each over in his hand before allocating their positions.

Long association with the cruiser did not help her fluctuating central processor. "What do you mean, Prowl?" she asked, keeping her vocalizer as neutral as possible.

He looked at her with those half-shuttered blue optics. "I never thought I would put myself in this situation again," he began quietly, pushing a pawn forward. Leaning across the table, she automatically did the same. So, as he spoke, they played. "I didn't want it, and I certainly didn't need it – until you came. And as illogical as it sounds, it is the truth. You are my partner and I realize now how, well, lonely this job has become since we increased operation here on Earth." He swapped her knight with his own and looked at her. "I spent a lot of time out there, just _thinking_. Not planning, not strategizing … just, _thinking_."

"And what conclusion did you come to?" She faced the admission as she would have a Decepticon stronghold – with determination and a spine of pure trylithium. Unwavering, unyielding – never giving ground while she had it.

Prowl slipped his knight forward, blocking her advancing front. "I didn't come to just one," he told her, meeting clear blue optic to emerald green.

"And that is?"

Optics hooded by that blood-red chevron, Prowl paused in his decision. His huge white hand wavered over the board. "I need you. And I _want_ you. Conflicting emotions on the battlefield – and necessity must always take precedence over wanting. But …" he sighed, "I find myself wanting both. And … desiring both."

Flamestrike's optics widened until her servos could no longer perform. She reached for her one remaining pawn and found her slim grey hand caught in his thick white one. "If you can put up with me." And he grinned softly, almost shyly.

Slowly, her world stopped spinning; it coalesced into something solid, more cohesive. Reaching out, she plucked his hand from hers and moved her pawn. "Checkmate." And smiled. "Only if you can put up with _me_, commander. If so, we will have an … interesting … partnership."

"I think we will," he agreed. "Rematch?"

OoOoOoOoO

_**It is the year 2005. The treacherous Decepticons have conquered the Autobot's home planet Cybertron. Now from secret staging bases on two of Cybertron's moons the Autobots plan to take back their homeworld …**_


End file.
